Former News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks appeared in court yesterday and denied five charges.
The 45-year-old entered not guilty pleas to counts linked to an alleged conspiracy to hack phones, conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.
Brooks, of Churchill, Oxfordshire, appeared in a packed courtroom at Southwark Crown Court alongside fellow former News Inter-national staff.
She denied conspiracy to hack phones between October 3, 2000, and August 9, 2006, as did former News of the World news editor James Weatherup and former managing editor Stuart Kuttner.
Brooks, former editor of both the News of the World and The Sun, also denied two charges of conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office. She also denied two counts of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.
It is alleged Brooks and her personal assistant Cheryl Carter, who also denies the charge, tried to remove boxes of archived material from the News International archive between July 6 and 9, 2011.
In a second count, Brooks, husband Charlie, former NI head of security Mark Hanna, security staff Lee Sandell and David Johnson, and driver Paul Edwards, are all accused of conspiring to pervert the course of justice by hiding documents, computers and other electronic equipment from officers investigating allegations of phone hacking and corruption of public officials relating to the News of the World and The Sun. All six today denied the charge.
Meanwhile, a police officer who sold information linked to high-profile figures including Kate Middleton has been jailed, it can be reported for the first time.
Details of former Metropolitan Police Con-stable Paul Flattley's two-year sentence can be made public after a charge was dropped against a Sun journalist who had been accused of paying him.
Flattley, 30, from Stockport in Cheshire, was paid £8636.89 for information about high-profile cases, between May 2008 and September 2011.
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