Rebekah Brooks articles from NY Times

According to an account in The Daily Mirror, a non-Murdoch tabloid, “the wild-eyed duo then started to harangue bemused editor Simon Kelner in a foul-mouthed tirade.”

Even before the hacking scandal, The News of the World was among a number of tabloids implicated when the police raided the office of Steve Whittamore, a private investigator.

Later, after Mr. Watson threatened to sue The Sun for libel over a series of inaccurate articles, “my neighbor caught people rummaging through my bins and rustling through papers in my garage,” he said.

According to an account in The Daily Mirror, a non-Murdoch tabloid, “the wild-eyed duo then started to harangue bemused editor Simon Kelner in a foul-mouthed tirade.”

The use of private investigators at The News of the World was also widespread during Ms. Brooks’s tenure.

Her closeness to Mr. Murdoch, who is said to regard her as a kind of favorite daughter (although he has four actual daughters), has protected her during the recent scandal engulfing the company, even as parliamentarians called on her to resign.

Woman Rises to Top in Male Tabloid Culture
By SARAH LYALL and JO BECKER

LONDON — It was March 2003, and Rebekah Wade, then the editor of The Sun newspaper, was being interrogated by the House of Commons select committee on culture and the media.

Woman Rises to Top in Male Tabloid Culture
By SARAH LYALL and JO BECKER

LONDON — It was March 2003, and Rebekah Wade, then the editor of The Sun newspaper, was being interrogated by the House of Commons select committee on culture and the media.

In 1994, she prepared for The News of the World’s interview with James Hewitt, a paramour of Princess Diana, by reserving a hotel suite and hiring a team to “kit it out with secret tape devices in various flowerpots and cupboards,” Piers Morgan, her former boss and now a CNN talk show host, writes in his memoir “The Insider.”

In extraordinary scenes in the House of Commons on Wednesday, legislator after legislator — most of them from the Labour Party — rose and demanded that Ms. Brooks, one of the most powerful figures in the British news media and a woman many have feared until now, should go.

Now, she and her husband, Charlie Brooks, a former horse trainer, are part of a high-powered coterie that includes Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife, Samantha; Mr. Murdoch’s daughter Elisabeth and her husband, the public relations executive Matthew Freud; and James Murdoch, Mr. Murdoch’s heir apparent, and his wife.

“It doesn’t work like that,” said Ian Hislop, editor of Private Eye magazine, which has long written about tabloid escapades.

When the presses started rolling, she ran over, grabbed a newly printed copy of The Sunday Times, and brought it back to The News of the World — which proceeded to use the material, verbatim, in its own paper the next day.

According to an account in The Daily Mirror, a non-Murdoch tabloid, “the wild-eyed duo then started to harangue bemused editor Simon Kelner in a foul-mouthed tirade.”

As a tabloid editor, Ms. Brooks embarked on a series of campaigns, agitating successfully for the introduction of a law allowing parents of young children to be notified when convicted sex offenders move to their neighborhoods.

As tough-talking as the men she led, Ms. Brooks refused to put up with chauvinism or insubordination.

From early on, she was known for her creative flair in getting articles and her lack of compunction in how she got them.

Now 43 and known by her new married name of Rebekah Brooks, she has used a winning combination of charm, effrontery, audacity and tenacity to thrive in the brutal, male-dominated world of the British tabloids.

The campaign backfired when it turned out that some of the photographs showed the wrong people and when vigilantes began harassing and threatening men whom they thought were pedophiles.

From early on, she was known for her creative flair in getting articles and her lack of compunction in how she got them.

A spokeswoman for News International said in an interview that there was in fact just one request by Ms. Brooks from Mr. Whittamore, and that “there was nothing to suggest that any information was retrieved using illegal methods.”

According to an account in The Daily Mirror, a non-Murdoch tabloid, “the wild-eyed duo then started to harangue bemused editor Simon Kelner in a foul-mouthed tirade.”

On another occasion in her early days, furious that the paper was about to be scooped by The Sunday Times’s serialization of a biography of Prince Charles, Ms. Brooks disguised herself as a Times cleaning lady and hid for two hours in the paper’s bathroom, according to Mr. Morgan.

The long-running saga reached new heights this week when British news reports revealed that the phone of Milly Dowler, a 13-year-old girl murdered in 2002, was hacked by The News of the World after she went missing but before her body was found, hampering the police investigation and adding to the distress of her parents.

Even before the hacking scandal, The News of the World was among a number of tabloids implicated when the police raided the office of Steve Whittamore, a private investigator.

At times, Ms. Brooks’s crusades were personal.

Later, after Mr. Watson threatened to sue The Sun for libel over a series of inaccurate articles, “my neighbor caught people rummaging through my bins and rustling through papers in my garage,” he said.

Such tales have passed into tabloid legend, as has Ms. Brooks’s uncanny knack for cultivating the powerful.

Woman Rises to Top in Male Tabloid Culture
By SARAH LYALL and JO BECKER

LONDON — It was March 2003, and Rebekah Wade, then the editor of The Sun newspaper, was being interrogated by the House of Commons select committee on culture and the media.

Two former senior employees, who requested anonymity because they still work in journalism, said that they were asked to dig up information about her husband at the time, the actor Ross Kemp, whom she suspected of having an affair.

Now 43 and known by her new married name of Rebekah Brooks, she has used a winning combination of charm, effrontery, audacity and tenacity to thrive in the brutal, male-dominated world of the British tabloids.

The long-running saga reached new heights this week when British news reports revealed that the phone of Milly Dowler, a 13-year-old girl murdered in 2002, was hacked by The News of the World after she went missing but before her body was found, hampering the police investigation and adding to the distress of her parents.

Later, after Mr. Watson threatened to sue The Sun for libel over a series of inaccurate articles, “my neighbor caught people rummaging through my bins and rustling through papers in my garage,” he said.

Such tales have passed into tabloid legend, as has Ms. Brooks’s uncanny knack for cultivating the powerful.

Now 43 and known by her new married name of Rebekah Brooks, she has used a winning combination of charm, effrontery, audacity and tenacity to thrive in the brutal, male-dominated world of the British tabloids.

She has risen to become chief executive of News International, Rupert Murdoch’s British newspaper subsidiary.

As a tabloid editor, Ms. Brooks embarked on a series of campaigns, agitating successfully for the introduction of a law allowing parents of young children to be notified when convicted sex offenders move to their neighborhoods.

Now 43 and known by her new married name of Rebekah Brooks, she has used a winning combination of charm, effrontery, audacity and tenacity to thrive in the brutal, male-dominated world of the British tabloids.

The topic: dubious tabloid practices.

(Their dissolving marriage would later make headlines when she was arrested for allegedly assaulting Mr. Kemp.

On another occasion in her early days, furious that the paper was about to be scooped by The Sunday Times’s serialization of a biography of Prince Charles, Ms. Brooks disguised herself as a Times cleaning lady and hid for two hours in the paper’s bathroom, according to Mr. Morgan.

When she was a secretary and wanted to become a writer, she took up horseback riding because the editor liked riding, a former supervisor recalled.

In 1994, she prepared for The News of the World’s interview with James Hewitt, a paramour of Princess Diana, by reserving a hotel suite and hiring a team to “kit it out with secret tape devices in various flowerpots and cupboards,” Piers Morgan, her former boss and now a CNN talk show host, writes in his memoir “The Insider.”

The use of private investigators at The News of the World was also widespread during Ms. Brooks’s tenure.

It is a sign of the confidence that Mr. Murdoch places in Ms. Brooks that he has kept her on despite one of the biggest mysteries surrounding her: how could any respectable tabloid editor in such a cutthroat business not know how her own reporters were getting information for articles in her own paper?

At the same time, as a rebuke to feminists who demanded an end to the Page 3 feature, she took care that her first P. 3 girl, as they are known, was named Rebekah and was identified as “Rebekah from Wapping” — Wapping being where The Sun was based.

“Rupert Murdoch adores her — he’s just very, very attached to her,” said a person who knows them both socially.

Such tales have passed into tabloid legend, as has Ms. Brooks’s uncanny knack for cultivating the powerful.

As part of her anti-pedophile campaign, she printed photographs of convicted sex offenders in an effort to “name and shame” them.

In 1994, she prepared for The News of the World’s interview with James Hewitt, a paramour of Princess Diana, by reserving a hotel suite and hiring a team to “kit it out with secret tape devices in various flowerpots and cupboards,” Piers Morgan, her former boss and now a CNN talk show host, writes in his memoir “The Insider.”

The use of private investigators at The News of the World was also widespread during Ms. Brooks’s tenure.

Ms. Brooks simply switched friends.

She declined a request to be interviewed for this article.

At the same time, as a rebuke to feminists who demanded an end to the Page 3 feature, she took care that her first P. 3 girl, as they are known, was named Rebekah and was identified as “Rebekah from Wapping” — Wapping being where The Sun was based.

She was a confidante of Cherie Blair, the wife of then-Prime Minister Tony Blair, at a time when Mr. Murdoch supported the Labour government.

“We have paid the police for information in the past,” she declared.

Soon after she became the deputy editor of The Sun — a laddish newspaper that features a seminaked young woman on Page 3 every day — a group of her underlings, she felt, were treating her disrespectfully.

“She called the ringleader into her office and said, ‘Be under no illusion — if you ever do that again, you’ll be out of here,’ ” one former editor recalled.

Ms. Enders suggested that Ms. Brooks functioned as something of a firewall for Mr. Murdoch — a buffer against the allegations.

Part of his approach is strategic, said the media analyst Clare Enders, founder of Enders Analysis.

The long-running saga reached new heights this week when British news reports revealed that the phone of Milly Dowler, a 13-year-old girl murdered in 2002, was hacked by The News of the World after she went missing but before her body was found, hampering the police investigation and adding to the distress of her parents.

The topic: dubious tabloid practices.

Part of his approach is strategic, said the media analyst Clare Enders, founder of Enders Analysis.

But Ms. Wade backtracked as fluently as she had come forward, declaring that she could not remember any examples and then proceeding, it seemed, to brush off the whole thing as another cheeky, walking-the-line incident in a career full of them.

When the political winds changed and Mr. Murdoch decided to back the Conservative Party, Many of Ms. Brooks’s Labour friends felt she had betrayed them and stopped socializing with her.

But Ms. Wade backtracked as fluently as she had come forward, declaring that she could not remember any examples and then proceeding, it seemed, to brush off the whole thing as another cheeky, walking-the-line incident in a career full of them.

As a tabloid editor, Ms. Brooks embarked on a series of campaigns, agitating successfully for the introduction of a law allowing parents of young children to be notified when convicted sex offenders move to their neighborhoods.

A spokeswoman for News International said in an interview that there was in fact just one request by Ms. Brooks from Mr. Whittamore, and that “there was nothing to suggest that any information was retrieved using illegal methods.”

From early on, she was known for her creative flair in getting articles and her lack of compunction in how she got them.

In 2003, she became editor of the tabloid The Sun, Britain’s best-selling daily newspaper, before being promoted to her current job two years ago.

Tom Watson, a Labour member of Parliament, recalled what happened to him in 2006, shortly after he resigned his position in Tony Blair’s government and called for Mr. Blair’s resignation.

Woman Rises to Top in Male Tabloid Culture
By SARAH LYALL and JO BECKER

LONDON — It was March 2003, and Rebekah Wade, then the editor of The Sun newspaper, was being interrogated by the House of Commons select committee on culture and the media.

The Sun was then an ardent Labour supporter.

Part of his approach is strategic, said the media analyst Clare Enders, founder of Enders Analysis.

The long-running saga reached new heights this week when British news reports revealed that the phone of Milly Dowler, a 13-year-old girl murdered in 2002, was hacked by The News of the World after she went missing but before her body was found, hampering the police investigation and adding to the distress of her parents.

Billing records kept by Mr. Whittamore, who specialized in “blagging,” or conning, information out of government agencies, phone companies and the like, show that he provided confidential data to 19 News of the World journalists; in at least two instances, he provided Ms. Brooks with unlisted numbers and in one case was able to obtain an address based on a person’s cellphone number.

In an interview last year in his office, Phil Hall, a former News of the World editor, called Ms. Brooks an “arch-networker.”

Ms. Enders suggested that Ms. Brooks functioned as something of a firewall for Mr. Murdoch — a buffer against the allegations.

In a strange incident last year that showed both Ms. Brooks’s closeness to the Murdochs and her love of a bold gesture, she and James Murdoch showed up unannounced at the offices of the newspaper The Independent before the national election.

But Mr. Murdoch issued a ringing endorsement for Ms. Brooks, saying that his company was committed to holding a full investigation of the recent allegations, under Ms. Brooks’s leadership.

In 1994, she prepared for The News of the World’s interview with James Hewitt, a paramour of Princess Diana, by reserving a hotel suite and hiring a team to “kit it out with secret tape devices in various flowerpots and cupboards,” Piers Morgan, her former boss and now a CNN talk show host, writes in his memoir “The Insider.”

Such tales have passed into tabloid legend, as has Ms. Brooks’s uncanny knack for cultivating the powerful.

Woman Rises to Top in Male Tabloid Culture
By SARAH LYALL and JO BECKER

LONDON — It was March 2003, and Rebekah Wade, then the editor of The Sun newspaper, was being interrogated by the House of Commons select committee on culture and the media.

According to an account in The Daily Mirror, a non-Murdoch tabloid, “the wild-eyed duo then started to harangue bemused editor Simon Kelner in a foul-mouthed tirade.”

But Ms. Wade backtracked as fluently as she had come forward, declaring that she could not remember any examples and then proceeding, it seemed, to brush off the whole thing as another cheeky, walking-the-line incident in a career full of them.

“ ‘My editor, Rebekah Wade, will pursue you for the rest of your life.

On another occasion in her early days, furious that the paper was about to be scooped by The Sunday Times’s serialization of a biography of Prince Charles, Ms. Brooks disguised herself as a Times cleaning lady and hid for two hours in the paper’s bathroom, according to Mr. Morgan.

But Ms. Wade backtracked as fluently as she had come forward, declaring that she could not remember any examples and then proceeding, it seemed, to brush off the whole thing as another cheeky, walking-the-line incident in a career full of them.

Part of his approach is strategic, said the media analyst Clare Enders, founder of Enders Analysis.

She broke the story of Mrs. Blair’s pregnancy during her husband’s premiership.

Part of his approach is strategic, said the media analyst Clare Enders, founder of Enders Analysis.

Asked whether she had ever paid the police for information, Ms. Wade, a supremely confident and striking figure with her shock of wild red hair, looked unabashed and unperturbed.

She declined a request to be interviewed for this article.

But Ms. Wade backtracked as fluently as she had come forward, declaring that she could not remember any examples and then proceeding, it seemed, to brush off the whole thing as another cheeky, walking-the-line incident in a career full of them.

In an interview last year in his office, Phil Hall, a former News of the World editor, called Ms. Brooks an “arch-networker.”

In a strange incident last year that showed both Ms. Brooks’s closeness to the Murdochs and her love of a bold gesture, she and James Murdoch showed up unannounced at the offices of the newspaper The Independent before the national election.

(Their dissolving marriage would later make headlines when she was arrested for allegedly assaulting Mr. Kemp.

Her closeness to Mr. Murdoch, who is said to regard her as a kind of favorite daughter (although he has four actual daughters), has protected her during the recent scandal engulfing the company, even as parliamentarians called on her to resign.

Two former senior employees, who requested anonymity because they still work in journalism, said that they were asked to dig up information about her husband at the time, the actor Ross Kemp, whom she suspected of having an affair.

The long-running saga reached new heights this week when British news reports revealed that the phone of Milly Dowler, a 13-year-old girl murdered in 2002, was hacked by The News of the World after she went missing but before her body was found, hampering the police investigation and adding to the distress of her parents.

In 1994, she prepared for The News of the World’s interview with James Hewitt, a paramour of Princess Diana, by reserving a hotel suite and hiring a team to “kit it out with secret tape devices in various flowerpots and cupboards,” Piers Morgan, her former boss and now a CNN talk show host, writes in his memoir “The Insider.”

In 1994, she prepared for The News of the World’s interview with James Hewitt, a paramour of Princess Diana, by reserving a hotel suite and hiring a team to “kit it out with secret tape devices in various flowerpots and cupboards,” Piers Morgan, her former boss and now a CNN talk show host, writes in his memoir “The Insider.”

In 1994, she prepared for The News of the World’s interview with James Hewitt, a paramour of Princess Diana, by reserving a hotel suite and hiring a team to “kit it out with secret tape devices in various flowerpots and cupboards,” Piers Morgan, her former boss and now a CNN talk show host, writes in his memoir “The Insider.”

She was released without charge, and police took no further action.)

As a tabloid editor, Ms. Brooks embarked on a series of campaigns, agitating successfully for the introduction of a law allowing parents of young children to be notified when convicted sex offenders move to their neighborhoods.

Billing records kept by Mr. Whittamore, who specialized in “blagging,” or conning, information out of government agencies, phone companies and the like, show that he provided confidential data to 19 News of the World journalists; in at least two instances, he provided Ms. Brooks with unlisted numbers and in one case was able to obtain an address based on a person’s cellphone number.

Now, she and her husband, Charlie Brooks, a former horse trainer, are part of a high-powered coterie that includes Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife, Samantha; Mr. Murdoch’s daughter Elisabeth and her husband, the public relations executive Matthew Freud; and James Murdoch, Mr. Murdoch’s heir apparent, and his wife.

Ms. Brooks’s rise has been steady, and quick.

Now, she and her husband, Charlie Brooks, a former horse trainer, are part of a high-powered coterie that includes Prime Minister David Cameron and his wife, Samantha; Mr. Murdoch’s daughter Elisabeth and her husband, the public relations executive Matthew Freud; and James Murdoch, Mr. Murdoch’s heir apparent, and his wife.

Her closeness to Mr. Murdoch, who is said to regard her as a kind of favorite daughter (although he has four actual daughters), has protected her during the recent scandal engulfing the company, even as parliamentarians called on her to resign.

In a strange incident last year that showed both Ms. Brooks’s closeness to the Murdochs and her love of a bold gesture, she and James Murdoch showed up unannounced at the offices of the newspaper The Independent before the national election.

Asked whether she had ever paid the police for information, Ms. Wade, a supremely confident and striking figure with her shock of wild red hair, looked unabashed and unperturbed.

Billing records kept by Mr. Whittamore, who specialized in “blagging,” or conning, information out of government agencies, phone companies and the like, show that he provided confidential data to 19 News of the World journalists; in at least two instances, he provided Ms. Brooks with unlisted numbers and in one case was able to obtain an address based on a person’s cellphone number.

From early on, she was known for her creative flair in getting articles and her lack of compunction in how she got them.

In 2003, she became editor of the tabloid The Sun, Britain’s best-selling daily newspaper, before being promoted to her current job two years ago.

The political editor of The Sun, George Pascoe-Watson, approached him at the Labour Party conference in Manchester.

In extraordinary scenes in the House of Commons on Wednesday, legislator after legislator — most of them from the Labour Party — rose and demanded that Ms. Brooks, one of the most powerful figures in the British news media and a woman many have feared until now, should go.

“She was very influential for the organization in terms of gaining the political contacts that Rupert wanted to have,” Mr. Hall said.

A spokeswoman for News International said in an interview that there was in fact just one request by Ms. Brooks from Mr. Whittamore, and that “there was nothing to suggest that any information was retrieved using illegal methods.”

News International has said that “it’s not familiar language to us.”

But Mr. Murdoch issued a ringing endorsement for Ms. Brooks, saying that his company was committed to holding a full investigation of the recent allegations, under Ms. Brooks’s leadership.

In 2003, she became editor of the tabloid The Sun, Britain’s best-selling daily newspaper, before being promoted to her current job two years ago.

Billing records kept by Mr. Whittamore, who specialized in “blagging,” or conning, information out of government agencies, phone companies and the like, show that he provided confidential data to 19 News of the World journalists; in at least two instances, he provided Ms. Brooks with unlisted numbers and in one case was able to obtain an address based on a person’s cellphone number.

Billing records kept by Mr. Whittamore, who specialized in “blagging,” or conning, information out of government agencies, phone companies and the like, show that he provided confidential data to 19 News of the World journalists; in at least two instances, he provided Ms. Brooks with unlisted numbers and in one case was able to obtain an address based on a person’s cellphone number.

The topic: dubious tabloid practices.

Billing records kept by Mr. Whittamore, who specialized in “blagging,” or conning, information out of government agencies, phone companies and the like, show that he provided confidential data to 19 News of the World journalists; in at least two instances, he provided Ms. Brooks with unlisted numbers and in one case was able to obtain an address based on a person’s cellphone number.

She broke the story of Mrs. Blair’s pregnancy during her husband’s premiership.

“Either she’s a complete incompetent, or she knew.”

On another occasion in her early days, furious that the paper was about to be scooped by The Sunday Times’s serialization of a biography of Prince Charles, Ms. Brooks disguised herself as a Times cleaning lady and hid for two hours in the paper’s bathroom, according to Mr. Morgan.

She was a confidante of Cherie Blair, the wife of then-Prime Minister Tony Blair, at a time when Mr. Murdoch supported the Labour government.

She was released without charge, and police took no further action.)