LONDON — British police arrested three men Tuesday, including a newspaper section editor, in an investigation that began with complaints from Prince Charles' office about possible phone-tapping, police and the newspaper said.I don't expect that to create much of a stir in the American media, but across the pond it is a different story - and not just because the Brits are overly protective of their royalty. There are reasons why this should be a big story in the U.S. too.
Police said they did not believe the phones of any members of the royal family had been tapped. But the calls of other public figures may have been intercepted, raising potential security issues, police said. They refused to say whose phone may have been tapped.
And police did not identify those who were arrested, but the News of the World tabloid said Clive Goodman, editor of its section on royalty, was among them.
The editor of the royalty section isn't a minor position at a British tabloid. No sirree. Since it inevitably means meeting the royal family as well as writing gossip and court reports about their doings it goes to a respected and fairly senior figure in the newspapers heirachy. Being an insider at court can be a powerful thing, politically.
Nor is the News of the World just any tabloid. It is the Sunday edition of the Sun newspaper - a tabloid with a circulation well in excess of 6 million and Britain's most read newspaper. The Sun is credited with giving Tony Blair his first electoral victory when it switched allegiances after decades of being pro-conservative. That many voters getting their daily news from one easy-to-read source is a lot of political clout too. It is the British newspaper equivalent of FOX News.
And that's no coincidence either. the News of the World and FOX have the same owner - Rupert Murdoch's News International group.
The UK's Guardian newspaper has a longer and far more revealing report than the LA Times. Here's what it has to say:
The arrests were part of a wider inquiry which began in December when three members of the royal household at Clarence House complained to Scotland Yard's Royalty Protection unit. The investigation has been extended because detectives believe that public figures beyond the royal household - among them an MP - have also had their phones tapped.The paper also reveals that the arrests and investigation are being handled by the Metropolitan Police's elite anti-terror branch SO13, due to "the seriousness of the potential security breach".
Officers from the Met's anti-terrorist branch and the specialist crime directorate have not ruled out the possibility that other royal households could have had their phones intercepted, or that the conversations could have involved members of the royal family.
Scotland Yard said three men were arrested early yesterday in south London. A 48-year-old man was arrested at his home in Putney, another man, 35, was arrested at home in Sutton, while a third, 50, was detained at another address, also in Sutton. All three were arrested under section 1 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 and taken to central London police stations where they remained in custody last night.
It later emerged that the 48-year-old man was Clive Goodman, the News of the World's royal correspondent, and that police had searched the paper's offices in Wapping, east London.
So what we actually have is a senior employee of Rupert Murdoch - already a powerful political "kingmaker" on both sides of the Atlantic - spying on members of the British royal family and by-the-by spying on other prominent public figures too, including senior British politicians.
That should be big news and should raise an obvious question. How much more of it is going on?
Well, SO13 are expanding their investigation so we may yet find out more.
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