Another former senior executive at the Sun, Fergus Shanahan, has left the newspaper after being cleared of authorising illegal payments to a public official.
Like other senior colleagues, Graham Dudman and John Edwards, who were also acquitted of similar charges, he has accepted a severance settlement from the Sun’s publisher, News UK.
Shanahan, 60, worked for the Sun for 26 years, serving as features editor, night editor and deputy editor to both David Yelland and Rebekah Brooks before becoming executive editor. In that capacity he was also the paper’s chief leader writer.
Shanahan said: “I am pleased we have reached an amicable agreement. I wish the new editor, Tony Gallagher, and the staff every success. I loved the paper and I will miss it.”
Dudman has taken a part-time consultancy with the News Associates journalism school. Edwards has joined the celebrity picture and video agency Flynet Pictures as director of news and assignments.
Four other staff who were cleared of charges brought by the Metropolitan police’s Operation Elveden team are still negotiating with News UK over their futures.
They are deputy editor Geoff Webster, royal editor Duncan Larcombe, Whitehall editor Clodagh Hartley and reporter Neil Millard.
