Third senior News of the World journalist arrested

James Weatherup in custody as further searches of paper’s offices are expected The police investigation into phone hacking at the News of the World has taken a dramatic turn with the surprise arrest of James Weatherup, a senior journalist at the paper. Weatherup, who has not previously been named in connection with the scandal, was arrested early on Thursday. He is currently in custody at a police station in outer London. The arrest is expected to trigger further searches of the News of the World offices in Wapping shortly. It is thought that police felt the paper had failed to be fully co-operative during searches last week and are determined to be more robust today. As news editor at the News of the World between 2004 and 2006, Weatherup was one of the inner circle of executives under the then editor, Andy Coulson, who later became David Cameron’s director of communications until earlier this year. As the third news editor at the paper under Coulson, Weatherup was one of a handful of senior employees who would take part in private discussions of major news stories with other senior members of the paper. Weatherup subsequently returned to being a senior reporter on the newspaper, but continued to hold his job title. He is a close colleague of Ian Edmondson, who was also arrested last week and in connection with the investigation. Edmondson, the paper’s former assistant editor (news), was dismissed in January. News International had not responded to a request for comment at the time of publication. More details soon … •

Posted by on April 14, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.