A private investigator who is considered to have confessed to hacking led to household names, including Prince Harry, the publisher of the Daily Mail claimed, the High Court of London heard.
Gavin Burrows, who was initially a witness at the center of most of the privacy allegations of unopposed data gathering, said that a statement dated August 2021 “was prepared by others without my knowledge”.
Associated Newspapers Limited (anl) has been accused by the group, which includes Prince Harry, Sir Elton John, Lee Hurley and Baroness Dureen Lawrence, of “Grace Breaches of Privacy”.
Anl repeated the “lurid” and “allegations that are “beneficial”.
Among the claims it hired private investigators to bug houses, to engage in phone hacking and dishonestly gather medical and financial information.
In a statement from August 2021, Mr. Burrows said hacked voicemails, taped landlines, and accessed financial and medical information in Sunday’s mail request.
But on Tuesday, the court heard that in September this year Mr. Burrows made a statement to Anl’s lawyers claiming that the Anl Document claiming to be the ANL Document claiming to be the Anl Document claiming to be the ANL Document claiming to be the ANL Document claiming to be the ANL Document claiming to be the Document to ANL Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming ANL Document Claiming 2021 document without signing it.
“I do not recognize the first statement of the Witness on August 16, 2021 and I believe that my signature on that document is a competence. It is very much not written in my kind of language,” he said.
“Furthermore, the content of the statement is untrue.”
In a recent statement he also said he did not do work for the Sunday Mail or the Daily Mail, except for the one time he had a job related to Sir Richard Branson that “did not involve any illegal activity”.
Mr. Burrows previously recanted his 2021 Witness statement in 2023.
The court is now hearing legal arguments on when Mr Burrows will be called as a witness for the trial, which is scheduled to take place in January.
David Servorne, the barrister representing the group, made an application to call Gr Burrows’ evidence which the ALD KC had requested, allowing him to examine the court.
Mr Justice Nicklin said Mr Serborne had seven days to decide whether he wanted to apply for the evidence they obtained, and whether he could call the evidence they obtained as “contrary”.
Another pre-trial hearing is expected to take place for the case before the end of 2025.