Sun journalist faces retrial over alleged payment to police officer

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/oct/02/sun-journalist-face-retrial-payment-police

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The first Sun journalist to be charged for payments to police leaking stories will face a retrial after a jury failed to reach a verdict at the Old Bailey.

Vince Soodin, 39, had been charged with conspiracy to cause misconduct in public office over a single payment of £500 to a police officer in Brighton in 2010.

The jury returned on Wednesday to tell the judge they could not reach a unanimous verdict and were discharged on Thursday afternoon after they said they could not reach a majority verdict either.

Judge Gordon told the jury: “Whether you can agree and it’s clear that you can’t, so be it.

“It happens sometimes and the procedure now is that I discharge you in giving a verdict in this case in your role, There is no point you struggling over this any longer. “

Soodin was the second journalist to come to trial as a result of Scotland Yard’s Operation Elveden investigation into unlawful disclosure of confidential information by public officials which has seen 23 journalists charged.

He had been arrested in August 2012 following disclosure by News International (now News UK) of emails between him and police sergeant James Bowes of Sussex Police in June 2010.

The officer had emailed the paper on Saturday 19 June using a false name “Mike” with a tip off about a three-year-old boy who had been bitten by a fox at a children’s party.

Soodin was manning the newsdesk on his own that day and sent off a “stock reply” saying he would be happy to pay for the information. He later recommended he be paid £750, but this was knocked down to £500 by his bosses.

He went on to corroborate the tip with a story appearing in the paper the following Monday but returned to Bowes for help in relation to the surname of the boy later that week.

During the trial his counsel William Harbage QC, told jurors that Bowes was treated like any other “tipster” and that Soodin had been “disarmingly open and frank” with his bosses that the information had come from a police officer.

By Soodin’s own calculations, he was one of the most junior members of the Sun’s editorial team, ranking 12th in the hierarchical ladder.