With the return of Rebekah Brooks to News UK and the coincidental departure of senior Sun journalists it is timely to ask what has happened to the 27 staff who were arrested during the Metropolitan police investigation into payments to public officials.
It was probably to be expected that the most senior staffers would go. Former managing editor Graham Dudman and picture editor John Edwards have accepted severance payments that are thought to be reasonably generous.
And it is understood that former deputy editor Fergus Shanahan will also be departing after agreeing a similar deal. He is expected to finalise details within days.
After almost three years away from the newspaper while fighting legal battles, their jobs had been taken on by others under an entirely new regime.
It would have been tough for the Sun to accommodate them and, going on what I understand, they had no particular appetite for a return to the fray anyway. Accepting pay-offs made both financial and emotional sense.
By far the majority of the Sun’s reporting staff who were originally arrested by the Met police’s Operation Elveden team have returned to the newspaper, or never left, as the list below illustrates.
Several of them did so reluctantly, wishing they could have gone elsewhere. They were outraged that the company, through News Corporation’s management standards committee (MSC), handed police internal emails and documents relating to payments for stories.
But jobs, especially at the salaries they were earning, were just not available. As one said: “We had little alternative but to bite the bullet.”
There is continuing rancour, but now only privately expressed, about a briefing to the press on behalf of the company back in January 2012 in which the MSC was said to have been created “to drain the swamp.”
The sense of betrayal by Rupert Murdoch’s organisation was felt among both junior and senior staff. “The depth of misery and desperation for those who were arrested cannot be over-stated,” said a person familiar with the situation.
Needless to say, there may be mixed feelings about the return of Brooks as News UK’s chief executive, but the MSC was created after she had resigned from the company. And she was said to be personally supportive of some of those who were arrested.
Most of the young reporters who have returned to work have prospered. Home affairs correspondent Tom Wells, regarded as a bright promotional prospect, was responsible for the Sun’s splash on Wednesday about the cost of the hunt for Madeleine McCann. And the paper’s agenda-setting exposure in July of Lord Sewel was reported by Stephen Moyes.
Nor is the legal battle quite over because two Sun journalists, district reporter Jamie Pyatt and the former head of news, Chris Pharo, face a retrial later this month.
Of those who were charged, only two - Anthony France and Nick Parker - were convicted. Crime reporter France, who received an 18-month suspended sentence for paying a police officer, is appealing against his conviction.
Parker, the paper’s chief foreign correspondent, was found guilty of handling a stolen mobile phone (though he didn’t know it was stolen), and received a three-month suspended sentence. Two months later, in February 2015, he was welcomed back to the paper.
Some of those arrested were never charged and never stopped working for the Sun. Some were obliged to step down awaiting possible charges and did not return to the paper until being told formally by the police there would no further action against them.
Charges against defence editor Virginia Wheeler were dropped on health grounds and she left the newspaper. Chief reporter John Kay, found not guilty at trial, has also left. He was already way beyond normal retirement age.
But the fate of four staff who were also cleared by juries - former deputy editor Geoff Webster, royal editor Duncan Larcombe, Whitehall editor Clodagh Hartley and reporter Neil Millard - has yet to be decided. All are said to be in negotiations with News UK.
Here then is the current state of play for the 27 staff who were arrested by the Metropolitan police:
Departed: Graham Dudman; John Edwards; Virginia Wheeler. Soon to depart: Fergus Shanahan. Retired: John Kay
Back at work: Nick Parker, Tom Wells, Stephen Moyes, Vince Soodin, Ryan Sabey, Brandon Malinsky. Never charged, and at work: Mike Sullivan, John Sturgis, Rhodri Phillips, David Willetts, Chris Pollard.
Left paper prior to being charged: Ben Ashford, Ben O’Driscoll, John Troup (all cleared at trial). John Coles (never charged)
Unresolved: Geoff Webster, Duncan Larcombe, Clodagh Hartley, Neil Millard
Awaiting retrial: Jamie Pyatt and Chris Pharo. Appealing against conviction: Anthony France
*This article was amended at 4pm, 4 September, to delete the name of Alastair Taylor who had been wrongly included in the list. He was not arrested. My apologies to him.
