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Thursday 4 August 2011

Is Piers Morgan leaving himself 'wriggle room'?

I see it reported that Piers Morgan has said that:
"To reiterate, I have never hacked a phone, told anyone to hack a phone, nor to my knowledge published any story obtained from the hacking of a phone."
Hmm, I wonder if Piers Morgan will confirm if he ever told his journalists and others not to hack phones or have them hacked.

I further wonder wonder if when presented with a story Piers Morgan always asked how the story had been sourced. If he did not then might Piers Morgan not be possibly guilty of "wilful blindness" as Mr Adrian Sanders accused James Murdoch of being during the Murdoch's appearance at the Culture, Media and Sport committee:
'Q269 Mr Sanders: Finally, are you familiar with the term "wilful blindness"?

James Murdoch: Mr Sanders, would you care to elaborate?

Q270 Mr Sanders: It is a term that came up in the Enron scandal. Wilful blindness is a legal term. It states that if there is knowledge that you could have had and should have had, but chose not to have, you are still responsible.

James Murdoch: Mr Sanders, do you have a question? Respectfully, I just do not know what you would like me to say.

Q271 Mr Sanders: The question was whether you were aware—

James Murdoch: I am not aware of that particular phrase.

Q272 Mr Sanders: But now you are familiar with the term, because I have explained it to you.

James Murdoch: Thank you, Mr Sanders.

Rupert Murdoch: I have heard the phrase before, and we were not ever guilty of that.'
I wonder which journalist will be first to raise this point with Piers Morgan? I doubt it will be the BBC as whilst they were keen to report every accusation being thrown at News International and the Murdochs, they are reporting the accusations against Piers Morgan from the angle of his denial and argument against the accusations. Anyone might think the BBC were interested in the whole phone-hacking affair purely as a way of protecting their excessive news market share from competition from a non-left wing biased organisation...

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