The Trinity Mirror, the publishing group which owns the Daily Mirror and Sunday Mirror titles, has been forced to admit to the London Stock Exchange that it was being investigated by the Metropolitan Police over phone hacking allegations says the search marketing team at clickmate.
The investigation centres on whether the newspaper group is criminally liable for a phone hacking conspiracy by previous employees (alleged).
Industry observers say that its final confirmation that the Mirror titles are under official investigation as part of the Met’s operation Weeting which has been operating for over two years. It’s brief is to see which other journalists and professionals were involved in phone hacking.
The Trinity statement to the Stock Exchange included the paragraphs: “Trinity Mirror plc notes that its subsidiary, MGN Limited, publisher of the group’s national newspapers, has been notified by the Metropolitan police that they are at a very early stage in investigating whether MGN is criminally liable for the alleged unlawful conduct by previous employees in relation to phone hacking on the Sunday Mirror.
“The group does not accept wrongdoing within its business and takes these allegations seriously. It is too soon to know how these matters will progress and further updates will be made if there are any significant developments.”
The Trinity Group is a public company and so is obliged to inform the Stock Exchange of any issues that might materially impact upon the profitability of the Group. A wide sweeping police investigation does carry that threat, so the Group had to admit to the development. The Group shares fell over 5% on the release of the statement.