News International withdrew its application to recover the costs of the Rebekah Brooks trial after the judge started to explore the company’s conduct in relation to the first phone-hacking scandal in 2006.
In a judgment handed down on Wednesday, Mr Justice Saunders said the company, now trading as News UK, had argued it would “be wrong in law to take into account the position of News International as the owner of the News of the World or its conduct as relevant factors” in his assessment of a cost application.
The judge wanted several questions answered. The judgment said: “The questions included some relating to the relationship between News International and the News of the World and the conduct of News International after the arrest and prosecution of Clive Goodman in 2006 up to the start of the investigation known as Operation Weeting.”
The eight-month phone hacking trial heard allegations of a cover-up following the arrest of the News of the World’s royal reporter Goodman, who was jailed along with private investigator Glenn Mulcaire in 2007 for hacking-related offences.
Saunders wanted to hear submissions from News UK on events between Goodman’s arrest and the re-opening of Scotland Yard’s hacking investigation, Operation Weeting, in January 2011.
The judge said he sought legal advice on News UK’s response to his questions but before he had received the submission from independent counsel, the publisher told him “they would not be seeking the recovering of the costs that had expended in paying for the defence of the defendants”.
It emerged at a hearing on Wednesday that Brooks was dropping her application for costs because News UK, who indemnified her, decided they were no longer going to seek reimbursement from her.
Brooks’s legal costs were estimated to run to between £5m and £7m. She was cleared of all charges in June.
The judge heard on Wednesday that Cheryl Carter, Brooks’s former secretary, and three security personnel, including News UK’s head of security Mark Hanna, were also dropping their applications for costs. There were also cleared of any offences.
Stuart Kuttner, the NoW’s former managing editor, and Brooks’s husband Charlie, were also cleared. Kuttner was indemnified by News UK from January 2013 and is seeking £135,000 in costs incurred before that date. Brooks, who was not indemnified by News UK, is applying to recover £500,000 in costs plus VAT.
The legal submissions made by News UK in relation to the costs will not be made public, Saunders ruled, as they were not referred to in open court and because the formal cost applications were never actually made.
