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| Phone hacking investigations and prosecutions 'could take three years' | Phone hacking investigations and prosecutions 'could take three years' |
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| Senior Scotland Yard officer Stephen Kavanagh is to take over Sue Akers's role overseeing the investigations into phone hacking and other alleged illegal activities by journalists, with the police budgeting for the process to last another three years and cost about £40m. | Senior Scotland Yard officer Stephen Kavanagh is to take over Sue Akers's role overseeing the investigations into phone hacking and other alleged illegal activities by journalists, with the police budgeting for the process to last another three years and cost about £40m. |
| Akers, who is retiring as a deputy assistant commissioner in October, told the Commons home affairs select committee on Tuesday that her role overseeing the three interlinked investigations will go to Kavanagh, a deputy assistant commissioner in the Metropolitan police's territorial policing division. | Akers, who is retiring as a deputy assistant commissioner in October, told the Commons home affairs select committee on Tuesday that her role overseeing the three interlinked investigations will go to Kavanagh, a deputy assistant commissioner in the Metropolitan police's territorial policing division. |
| She also told MPs that the inquiries – Operation Weeting (phone hacking), Operation Elveden (illegal payments to public officials) and Operation Tuleta (computer hacking and other breaches of privacy not covered by Weeting) – were budgeted to cost just less than £9m this year, and in the region of £40m over four years. | She also told MPs that the inquiries – Operation Weeting (phone hacking), Operation Elveden (illegal payments to public officials) and Operation Tuleta (computer hacking and other breaches of privacy not covered by Weeting) – were budgeted to cost just less than £9m this year, and in the region of £40m over four years. |
| Akers added that the Met had 185 officers and civilian staff working on the investigations – 96 on Operation Weeting, 70 on Operation Elveden and 19 on Operation Tuleta. | Akers added that the Met had 185 officers and civilian staff working on the investigations – 96 on Operation Weeting, 70 on Operation Elveden and 19 on Operation Tuleta. |
| When pressed on how much longer the investigations would take, Akers replied that "resources have been factored in for the next three years". | When pressed on how much longer the investigations would take, Akers replied that "resources have been factored in for the next three years". |
| Kavanagh is expected to add the role to his existing job in the territorial division, which is responsible for day-to-day, on-the-street policing across London. Akers is a DAC in the Met's specialist crime and operations division, overseeing specialist investigations. | |
| In her final appearance before the committee before she retires, Akers was asked if the investigations were now winding down. "That's probably not how I would describe it," she replied. | |
| She said that the phone-hacking investigation was now switching priorities, with the Met having attempted to make contact with all potential victims and eight people charged in relation to the Operation Weeting investigation. | |
| "We are now prioritising getting cases through court. We have gone as far as we can on victim notification," Akers added. | |
| She said it was harder to say how much longer Operation Elveden would take to complete, as the extent of the investigation into improper payments to police and other public officials depended on information provided by newspapers involved. | |
| Lord Justice Leveson's recommendations on the future of press regulation and any interventions by the information commissioner could also affect the length of the investigations, she added. | |
| Akers said the Met and Crown Prosecution Service would consider the likelihood of further criminal prosecutions. | |
| "An exit strategy is one of the most difficult issues. In terms of the phone hacking, it's perhaps easier to see an end because we now have people charged. That needs to take its course through the courts," Akers said. | |
| "In terms of the corrupt payments, that very much depends on the co-operation of the papers. If we're uncovering corrupt police officers we feel that we should continue to do that. But at some point... there is an enormous amount of money being spent on this, a lot of police resource and post-Olympics we're going to be in very tight financial times." | |
| She was asked by committee chairman Keith Vaz: "£40m of taxpayers' money, half the people haven't actually been notified, only eight people have been charged, is that a concern to you?" | |
| Akers replied: "No. I think that the fact that people have been charged under Weeting represents a success in our investigation. Elveden is still under consideration." | |
| So far there have been 25 arrests related to Operation Weeting, 43 in relation to Operation Elveden and 11 linked to Operation Tuleta. | |
| Akers said that as of 31 August the Met had identified a total of 4,744 potential or likely victims of phone hacking by the News of the World. | |
| Of these, 1,069 were "likely victims" and 658 had been contacted. But 388 were uncontactable and Scotland Yard had chosen not to contact 23 others "for operational reasons", Akers said. | |
| A further 3,675 were "potential victims", where a name and phone number had been found in evidence searched by the police. Of these, 1,894 had been contacted but 1,781 were uncontactable. | |
| Pressed on why the Met had been unable to contact almost 2,200 potential or likely victims, Akers said in many cases it was either because the mobile phone number was no longer in use, or was linked to a name that was so common that the police had been unable to identify an individual owner. | |
| "We're dealing with material that is six years old, so lots of people don't have the same telephone numbers, people move on," she added. "It's very difficult this long after the event. There's a whole range of reasons why we haven't been able to contact them. We have to draw the line somewhere." | |
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