Rebekah Brooks could not be shown to have authorised payments to private investigator Glenn Mulcaire during her editorship at the News of the World,a jury heard.
The suggestion came as documents shown at the Old Bailey also revealed that Mulcaire had a 12-month contract with the paper, signed in September 2001, in which he would receive £92,000 - in weekly payments of £1769.
But it was claimed that Brooks - editor from May 2000 to January 2003 - could not be shown to have signed payments to Mulcaire during her time as editor. Michael Gill, group financial controller of News UK, previously News International, told the Old Bailey there were levels of approval, so certain managers could only authorise payments up to a certain amount.
Jurors were shown lists of payments that went through each month.
In April 2002 - when stories were published using material from Milly Dowler's phone - the court saw there were four payments to Mulcaire's company Nine Consultancy Ltd.
Jonathan Laidlaw QC, representing Brooks, said the payments were just four of "many hundreds of payments for that month", which Mr Gill confirmed.
Mr Laidlaw said: "Not a single one was authorised by Mrs Brooks." Mr Gill said that was also correct.
Prosecutor Andrew Edis QC asked about the £92,000 contract, Mr Gill said it should have had both legal and editorial approval.
Brooks, 45, of Churchill, Oxfordshire; former NotW editor Andy Coulson, 45, from Charing in Kent; former NotW head of news Ian Edmondson, 44, from Raynes Park, south-west London; and the tabloid's ex-managing editor Stuart Kuttner, 73, from Woodford Green, Essex, are on trial for conspiring with others to hack phones between October 3, 2000 and August 9, 2006. The case was adjourned to today at 10am.
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