Jude Law, Dannii Minogue and 35 others are receiving giant cash payouts from Rupert Murdoch’s media empire after having been victims of the News Of The World phone hacking scandal.
In London court on Thursday Murdoch’s media empire was ordered to apologise and pay up in what was the largest group of claimant settlements to come out of the High Court hearings for the phone-hacking victims so far. Jude Law received 130,000 pounds, plus legal costs as part of his settlement.
“Settled” is an ironic word to use considering the circumstances of the heinous invasion of privacy the victims underwent. In a statement Law described the personal consequences the phone-hacking had on him and it sounds entirely unsettling:
“No aspect of my private life was safe from intrusion by News Group Newspapers, including the lives of my children and the people who work for me. It was not just that my phone messages were listened to. News Group also paid people to watch me and my house for days at a time and to follow me and those close to me, both in this country and abroad. I changed my phones, I had my house swept for bugs but still the information kept being published. I started to become distrustful of people close to me.”
For News Group, the relentless pursuit of scoops has cost them the dissolution of a 168-year-old publication, hundreds of jobs, millions of pounds in claimant damages and the organisation’s reputation. That seems fair.
Via New York Times
