Woman held in phone hacking probe
Police investigating allegations of phone hacking at a national newspaper arrest a woman in Yorkshire on suspicion of conspiring to intercept voicemail messages.
Scotland Yard said on Thursday a female suspect was detained just before 7am at a residential address in West Yorkshire.
The woman was arrested on suspicion of conspiring to intercept mobile phone voicemail messages and was being questioned at a police station in Yorkshire, a spokesman said.
According to reports, the woman is understood to be 39-year-old Terenia Taras, the partner or former partner of a man who was employed at the News of the World until 2005.
The arrest is part of Operation Weeting, a new investigation into phone hacking allegations involving the News of the World which was launched by the Metropolitan Police in January.
The paper’s former royal reporter Clive Goodman and private detective Glenn Mulcaire were jailed in 2007 for intercepting messages from members of the Royal household.
The new inquiry was set up following allegations that other famous people also had their messages intercepted.
Three News of the World journalists have been arrested since the new inquiry was launched.
Suspect ‘not NoW staff’
Scotland Yard gave no details about the suspect detained this morning, but News of the World said the arrest did not relate to a current or former member of full-time staff.
“We have been co-operating fully with the police inquiry since our voluntary disclosure of evidence reopened the police investigation,” News International, who owns the paper, said in a statement.
“Since then we have been determined to deal with these issues both on the criminal and civil side. In April we admitted liability in several civil cases and we are attempting to bring these to a fair resolution.”
Damages paid
Earlier this week football pundit Andy Gray became the latest celebrity to settle with the paper’s publishers, accepting £20,000 in damages for voicemail interceptions.
News Group Newspapers reached a similar agreement with actress Sienna Miller, who received £100,000 in damages.
Other high-profile figures who suspect that their phone messages were intercepted and have launched legal action include politicians John Prescott and George Galloway, actor Jude Law, comedian Steve Coogan, footballers Paul Gascoigne and Ryan Giggs and television presenter Ulrika Jonsson.
Last week former High Court judge Sir Charles Gray was appointed to oversee the compensation scheme set up by the News of the World’s publishers for victims of phone hacking.
The scheme aims to offer a way for phone hacking victims to be compensated without having to go to court and incur legal costs.