Rebekah Brooks Re-Arrested in UK Phone Hacking Scandal

Rupert Murdoch’s former deputy Rebekah Brooks is back in custody, part of a police sweep that also reportedly nabbed her husband Charlie, a horse trainer.

According to ABC News, Brooks, a former editor of the News of the World tabloid, and her husband were among six people held on suspicion of perverting the course of justice following dawn raids by officers investigating hacking at the now-closed newspaper.

A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police, quoted by the Brisbane Times, said:

“The co-ordinated arrests were made between approximately 5 a.m. and 7 a.m. this morning by officers from Operation Weeting, the MPS inquiry into the phone-hacking of voicemail boxes.”

The News of the World phone hacking scandals, which have led to more than 40 arrests, broke into the open last year after allegations that the cellphone voicemail of a teenager, later found murdered, had been hacked by an employee of the tabloid.

This is not the first time Murdoch’s red-haired protégée has been arrested in connection with phone hacking. In July of 2011, just two days after she had resigned as CEO of News International — the U.K. arm of Murdoch’s News Corporation — Brooks was arrested on suspicion of conspiring to intercept communications and of corrupting police officers.

At the time she was questioned for nine hours before being released on bail.

In the latest arrests, police would say only that a number of addresses connected to the suspects had been searched.

The Guardian says lawyers for News International and Brooks declined comment on the report of her arrest.

For more on Rebekah Brooks‘ latest arrest, watch the following video by CNBC:

via USA Today
Image: Vanity Fair