Scotland Yard Detective Convicted in Tabloid Scandal
Offered to sell information to News of the World about the phone-hacking investigation against them
A senior Scotland Yard detective was found guilty Thursday of trying to sell confidential information to a tabloid in the first conviction of a police officer in a corruption probe spawned by Britain's phone-hacking scandal.
A London jury took just a few hours to find Det. Chief Inspector April Casburn, one of the force's highest-ranking female detectives, guilty of misconduct in public office for leaking details of the phone-hacking investigation and seeking payment for it. The publication to which she made the offer, the News of the World, was the very newspaper under investigation for allegedly tapping into the private voicemails of thousands of people to feed its appetite for scoops.
The tabloid was shut down amid a public uproar in July 2011 after it emerged that reporters had intercepted messages left on the cellphone of a kidnapped 13-year-old girl who was later found killed. The scandal sparked three police investigations, including one into the bribery of public officials by journalists.
