Phone Hacking: Hugh Grant latest star to sue News of the World
Hugh Grant, the British actor, has become the latest celebrity to sue over claims his phone was hacked by journalists at the News of the World.
Hugh Grant outside the Leveson Inquiry: the British actor has been a vocal critic of British newspapers. Photo: CARL COURT/AFP/Getty Images
By Telegraph Reporters9:30AM BST 14 Sep 2012
The Four Weddings and a Funeral and Love Actually Star launched legal action on Thursday, on the eve of a High Court appointed deadline. Reports claimed yesterday that any money Grant won from News International would be donated to other victims of phone hacking.
The 52 year-old, who lives in West London, has been a high-profile critic of invasions of privacy by the press and last month became a director of a new not-for-profit company set up by Hacked Off, the campaign group.
NI has already settled more than 50 claims, following a payment of £2 million in damages to the parents of the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler and a further £1m given to charity of their choice.
It is said that 68 recent civil claims for damages have been lodged against News International and up to 40 more are expected before a deadline today. Yesterday it also emerged that a Welsh priest whose voicemail messages were intercepted by the now defunct tabloid to get scoops about one of his parishioners, the British pop star Charlotte Church, is also suing NI.
Fr Richard Reardon, a Roman Catholic priest in Cardiff, launched legal action after Scotland Yard told him the newspaper’s former private detective, Glenn Mulcaire, had his phone number among thousands of pages of notes about victims.
He spoke with the Church family regularly and shared voice mails and text messages with them, sources told Bloomberg. The singer, who performed at Chairman Rupert Murdoch’s wedding in 1999, when she was 13, and her parents received £600,000 in damages and costs earlier this year.
The priest is the first religious figure to sue, as the scandal has focused on journalists targeting celebrities, politicians, crime victims and their families. It comes as up to 300 more people, including the former England footballer Sol Campbell, are to claim compensation from NI as alleged victims of phone-hacking.
The Apprentice contestant Ruth Badger, the former pop singer and reality TV star Kerry Katona and her ex-husband Brian McFadden have also issued damages claims against the publisher of the News of the World.
But not all of those believed to have had their voicemail messages intercepted by private detectives working for the tabloid newspaper were public figures. Among the other individuals now taking legal action are Kirsty Brimelow, a barrister, Robin Winskell, a sports lawyer, and Daniel Boffey, a journalist.
The names were disclosed at a High Court case management hearing earlier this month. In addition, 395 people have asked the Metropolitan Police to let them know if they too had their phone messages listened to by journalists hoping to find private information for stories.
Of those, 124 claims have been accepted into the compensation fund set up by Rupert Murdoch’s print empire. That would put the total number of fresh claims at some 240.
It emerged this month that many potential victims may still not have been told that their names featured in the notebooks and emails seized from News International and private detectives.
Aside from the mounting civil claims, Scotland Yard is carrying out three separate criminal inquiries that could cost up to £40m and take four years. But out of 4,744 potential victims of phone-hacking, only 2,500 have been contacted by detectives and the rest may be unreachable.
So far 25 people have been arrested in the phone-hacking probe, Operation Weeting, and 46 in the inquiry into corrupt payments to public officials, Op Elveden. Former News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks has appeared in court charged with conspiring to hack the phones of more than 600 people including the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler.
The 44-year-old's appearance at Westminster Magistrates Court follows that last month of six of her former colleagues from the News of the World, who face similar charges. Lawyers for Fr Reardon, Church declined to comment as did a NI spokesman. Grant was unavailable for comment on the Guardian’s claims about his case.
