Rupert Murdoch apology to Milly Dowler family was sincere, says lawyer

The News Corp boss ‘held his head in his hands’ as he apologised to the murdered girl’s family over phone hacking Rupert Murdoch has made a “full and humble” apology to the family of the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler at a private meeting held at a central London hotel. The global head of News Corporation “held his head in his hands” and repeatedly told the family he was “very, very sorry”, according to the Dowlers’ lawyer Mark Lewis. “He was very humbled and very shaken and very sincere,” said Lewis speaking outside the meeting at the five-star hotel. “I think this was something that had hit him on a very personal level and was something that shouldn’t have happened. He apologised many times. I don’t think somebody could have held their head in their hands so many times and say that they were sorry.” Moments before Lewis emerged Murdoch had appeared outside the hotel to shouts of “shame on you” from a handful of protesters. Addressing a scrum of reporters he said it was a private meeting and he had apologised before leaving. Lewis said Murdoch had called the meeting at which Milly Dowler’s parents Sally and Bob and her sister Gemma had told Murdoch his newspapers “should lead the way to set the standard of honesty and decency in the field and not what had gone on before”. Murdoch had replied that the News of the World’s actions were “not the standard set by his father, a respected journalist, not the standard set by his mother”. It emerged last week that Milly Dowler’s mobile phone had been hacked after her death. Voicemails were accessed on behalf of the News of the World, and messages were deleted to make room for more recordings. This gave the family false hope that she was still alive. Since then her family have found themselves at the centre of the phone-hacking scandal, meeting the prime minister, the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, and the deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg this week. Lewis said: “It has been a big week for the Dowlers to hear people say they are sorry. Both on a political front – the deputy prime minister, the prime minister and the leader of the opposition – [and now] Rupert Murdoch.” Asked by journalists if the family forgave Murdoch for the hacking of their dead daughter’s mobile phone, Lewis said: “It is a question of forgive but not forget … they won’t necessarily forgive the people who intruded on their privacy.” Phone hacking Rupert Murdoch Milly Dowler Newspapers & magazines National newspapers Newspapers Matthew Taylor guardian.co.uk

Posted by on July 16, 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.