It has been implied in recent press reports that the CPS has spent £33m prosecuting journalists. This is not correct – this figure represents the cost of the police investigations and not the CPS consideration of charges and subsequent prosecutions. The CPS has spent £2.2m (up to December 2014) bringing cases in phone hacking and public corruption cases against more than 50 people (many of whom are not journalists) as well as deciding that charges should not be pursued against 49 people of which 25 were journalists. The majority of CPS decision making in these cases has been completed within three months of all the evidence being received from police.
12/3/15
Clarification regarding Mirror hacking allegations
It has been reported in the Independent and i newspapers that the CPS is currently considering charging decisions in relation to phone hacking at titles that belong to the Mirror Group Newspaper. To clarify, other than the completed case of one journalist, who pleaded guilty to a phone hacking offence in November 2014, the police have not submitted full files to the CPS for a charging decision in relation to allegations of phone hacking either by journalists at the Mirror newspaper, or by MGN group.
19/3/15
