Washington
UK police special enquiry team to examine role of Washington Post chief in email deletions
A British police special enquiry team is examining allegations that Will Lewis, now the chief executive of the Washington Post, presided over the deliberate destruction of emails at Rupert Murdoch’s UK newspaper business when he worked for the company 13 years ago.
The Met has told the former Labour prime minister Gordon Brown that its standing unit responsible for high-profile cases is reviewing a complaint he had submitted about Lewis after fresh disclosures emerged during civil actions relating to the phone-hacking scandal.
The letter, seen by the Guardian, is signed by the Met’s most senior officer, Mark Rowley, and tells Brown: “Please be assured that the contents of your letter, dated 2 May 2024, is being considered by the Met’s special enquiry team.”
The police chief adds: “The issues you raise are complex and will take time to consider against investigations that have already taken place.”
Brown’s original letter to Rowley had urged him to review new evidence relating to “the concealment and destruction of up to 30 million emails, hard drives and documents” – and police to launch an investigation “into the destruction of evidence” and “the cover-up that followed”.
In response, Brown, writing in the Guardian, questions whether Lewis is an appropriate leader for the flagship US newspaper owned by the billionaire founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos – accusing Lewis of displaying a “lack of ethics” when he worked for Murdoch during the hacking scandal.
“Blazoned across the top of every edition of the Washington Post is the statement, ‘Democracy dies in darkness.’ But what if the publisher himself is a master of the dark arts?” Brown says.
The former PM goes on to accuse Lewis of trying to mislead British detectives investigating phone hacking at the News of the World in the summer of 2011 – by telling police that Brown himself was behind a plot to steal emails of senior executives at the tabloid’s UK owner, Murdoch’s News International.
“I have only recently discovered how Lewis attempted to accuse me of a crime I did not commit,” Brown says. He accuses Lewis of being engaged in a “complete fabrication”.
“While Lewis has always claimed that he was Mr Clean Up, these new allegations point to a cover-up,” he says.
Documents disclosed in high court civil actions this week include a minute taken by the Met police of a meeting detectives had with Lewis on 8 July 2011. Detectives were inquiring into the deletion of emails belonging to senior executives at Murdoch’s newspaper company.
In the meeting, Lewis justified the deletions by accusing Brown of “controlling” a plot with the former Labour MP Tom Watson to obtain the emails of Rebekah Brooks, the then chief executive of News International, through a third party. Lewis was the company’s general manager at the time.
“We got a warning from a source that a current member of staff had got access to Rebekah’s [Brooks’] emails and had passed them to Tom Watson MP,” Lewis told the police, who told officers he went on to meet the individual behind the claim.
“The source repeated the threat,” Lewis continued, according to the police memo. “Then the source came back and said it was a former member of staff and the emails had definitely been passed and that it was controlled by Gordon Brown.”
Brown writes that the police officer who headed the initial hacking investigation, Sue Akers, now regards this explanation as unbelievable, citing comments she made to the New York Times earlier this month. “Gordon Brown was obviously one of the victims,” she said. “The thought that he would do that is ludicrous.”
A spokesperson for the Washington Post said that Lewis declined to comment. He has consistently denied allegations of wrongdoing.
Lewis has enjoyed a high-flying career before and after the hacking scandal. He remained at News International until 2014, then moved on to another senior role in the Murdoch empire, as chief executive of Dow Jones, publisher of the Wall Street Journal, until 2020.
Lewis was picked by Bezos to become chief executive of the Washington Post last year, and he caused controversy at the US paper by trying to appoint an old ally, the Briton Robert Winnett, as editor. After a furore, Winnett eventually decided not to take up the job.
In June, Bezos sent a memo to staff at the newspaper, defending Lewis: “Team – I know you’ve already heard this from Will, but I wanted to also weigh in directly: the journalistic standards and ethics at The Post will not change.”
Brown said he now he believed the Met police memo demonstrated that Lewis “gave the game away” because “his explanation conceded that the emails were destroyed to prevent them being seen”.
The email archives of a handful of senior executives at Murdoch’s UK operation, including those of Lewis and Brooks, had been deleted a few months earlier in January 2011, during a period in which allegations of phone hacking at the News of the World were growing.
Brown writes: “The destroyed emails that the police wanted were likely to have revealed much more of News Group’s intrusion into the private lives of thousands of innocent people, not least ordinary families hit by tragedy, and almost certainly would have added to what I have only recently discovered about what happened to me.”
Back in July 2011, Lewis told police that Brooks was anxious about her emails becoming public, because of her professional relationship with Tony Blair, Brown’s predecessor as prime minister. “She was a Tony Blair supporter whilst she was editor of the Sun,” Lewis told officers.
“They were very good friends. There was potential for that to be used against her in a negative way,” Lewis said.
Civil actions relating to alleged phone hacking have been running in the English courts for more than a decade. Murdoch’s News Group has paid out hundreds of millions and settled more than 1,300 lawsuits relating to hacking at the now-closed News of the World, but always rejected allegations of wrongdoing at the Sun.
Brown writes in the Guardian he already knew that the Sunday Times had, among other things, “accessed information about my mortgage from my building society, had reverse engineered my telephone number, had faked my voice to secure personal information about me from my lawyer, and had paid an investigator to break into the police national computer to find out what personal information about me was available.”
But he claims he now knows the intrusion went much further than that.
“More recently, I have been given information that the Murdoch group also paid investigators to break into other personal accounts of mine – including bank, gas and electricity – suggesting that nothing was out of bounds.” Brown explains.
Murdoch’s goals were political and commercial, the former prime minister argues. The media mogul wanted to take full control of Sky television, buy control of ITV, “neuter the BBC” and “control much of the highly profitable UK telecoms industry, all of which the Conservatives were ready to go along with”.
A spokesperson for Murdoch’s News UK said that Brown had only seen “partial information” from the civil cases and “does not have access to all material including detailed statements served by the defence”.
They added: “He is seeking to persuade the Met to take sides in a public debate.”
It was “strongly denied” that News International “sought to impede or worse conceal evidence from the Met” by deleting emails, the spokesperson added.
They cited a Crown Prosecution Service statement from December 2015, which said: “There is no evidence to suggest that email deletion was undertaken in order to pervert the course of justice.”
The Newsfeed
This week, the team brings you stories about how communities including Filipino immigrants, Sephardic Jews and Somalis arrived in the Pacific Northwest
Each week on The Newsfeed, host Paris Jackson and a team of veteran journalists dive deep into one topic and provide impactful reporting, interviews and community insights from sources you can trust. Each day this week, this post will be updated with a new story from the team.
Group hopes to boost recognition for Seattle’s Filipinotown
By Venice Buhain
The group Filipinotown Seattle hopes to make sure that the legacy of Filipino Americans in Seattle’s Chinatown-International District isn’t forgotten.
One of the group’s current projects is pushing for a Filipinotown placemarking sign in the CID.
“Filipino Americans have had a presence here for over 100 years in Seattle,” said Filipinotown Seattle Executive Director Devin Israel Cabanilla.
He said that the signage is important to remind people that “the International District is not just Chinatown. Japantown. Filipinotown is here as well.”
The group held a poll on what signage might look like and where it might be located. It would be similar to the Chinatown sign on South Jackson Street and Fifth Avenue South, or the Wing Luke Museum
In the early 20th century, the area now known as the CID was a hub full of businesses, entertainment, social groups and housing that served Seattle’s growing immigrant population from Asia and elsewhere. The communities all intermingled throughout the CID.
“This area was a central place for Asian Pacific immigrants simply because of segregation,” Cabanilla said.
Because the Philippines was a U.S. territory from 1898 to 1946, Filipino immigrants were unaffected by laws in the 1920s that restricted immigration from Japan or China. Many Filipinos came to study at the University of Washington or to work in burgeoning industries, like lumber, farming, canneries and factories.
While the physical Filipino presence in terms of buildings and storefronts in the CID dwindled in the later 20th century with redevelopment, Seattle Filipinos and Filipino Americans continued to make impacts locally, regionally and nationally.
“It may not have been in terms of storefronts, but our presence has always existed in terms of politics, culture as well,” Cabanilla said.
The Seattle Department of Transportation said it is aware that the group is working on its signage request, but the Department of Neighborhoods has not yet received a formal request. They are also working to develop a clearer process for this and other similar neighborhood signage proposals.
Filipinotown Seattle said it hopes that the sign helps remind Seattle of the CID’s unique designation as a neighborhood shaped by many immigrants and migrants to Seattle.
“Is it Chinatown? Is it Japantown? Is it Little Saigon? It’s all those things. And I think re cultivating that this is a multicultural district, Filipinotown is helping establish: Yes, it’s more than one thing,” Cabanilla said.
Venice Buhain is a multimedia journalist at Cascade PBS. She previously was the Cascade PBS’s associate news editor and education reporter. Venice has also worked for KING 5, The Seattle Globalist and TVW News.
Venice Buhain is a multimedia journalist at Cascade PBS. She previously was the Cascade PBS’s associate news editor and education reporter. Venice has also worked for KING 5, The Seattle Globalist and TVW News.
The state of Washington is getting a seventh temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The Marysville Washington Temple was announced Sunday night during a devotional in the Marysville Washington Stake by Elder Hugo E. Martinez, a General Authority Seventy in the church’s United States West Area Presidency.
“We are pleased to announce the construction of a temple in Marysville, Washington,” the First Presidency said in a statement. “The specific location and timing of the construction will be announced later. This is a reason for all of us to rejoice and express gratitude for such a significant blessing — one that will allow more frequent access to the ordinances, covenants and power that can only be found in the house of the Lord.”
The other temples in Washington are the Columbia River, Moses Lake, Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma and Vancouver temples.
The church has 214 temples in operation. Plans for another 170 temples have been announced; many of those temples are in various stages of planning and construction.
Sunday’s temple announcement follows the new practice of the church’s First Presidency, which determines where temples will be built — and when and how they will be announced.
The First Presidency directed a General Authority Seventy to announce the first temple in Maine at a fireside there in December.
In January, church President Dallin H. Oaks said the Maine announcement set the pattern for future temple announcements.
“The best place to announce a temple is in that temple district,” he told the Deseret News.
The First Presidency will continue to decide where future temples will be built. It then will “assign someone else to make the announcement in the place where the temple will be built,” he said.
This pattern came to him as a strong impression after he assumed leadership of the church in October, following the death of his friend, President Russell M. Nelson.
This came as a strong impression to him shortly after he assumed the leadership of the church, President Oaks said.
The church remains in the midst of an aggressive temple-building era. President Nelson announced 200 new temples from 2018 to 2025. All but one were announced at general conference.
Five dozen temples are now under construction.
President Oaks now has overseen the announcement of two temples, neither at a general conference.
At the October conference he said that “with the large number of temples now in the very earliest phases of planning and construction, it is appropriate that we slow down the announcement of new temples.”
Ten new temples are scheduled to be dedicated in the next six months.
- May 3: Davao Philippines Temple.
- May 3: Lindon Utah Temple.
- May 31: Bacolod Philippines Temple.
- June 7: Yorba Linda California Temple.
- June 7: Willamette Valley Oregon Temple.
- Aug. 16: Belo Horizonte Brazil Temple.
- Aug. 16: Cleveland Ohio Temple.
- Aug. 30: Phnom Penh Cambodia Temple.
- Oct. 11: Miraflores Guatemala City Guatemala Temple.
- Oct. 18: Managua Nicaragua Temple.
Two-thirds of the 170 temples still to be built are outside the United States.
Temples are distinct from the meetinghouses where Latter-day Saints worship Jesus Christ each Sunday. Temples are closed on Sundays, but they open during the week as sanctuaries where church members go to find peace, make covenants with God and perform proxy ordinances for deceased relatives.
On a perfect day in Seattle for football, Washington took the field inside Husky Stadium for its first scrimmage of spring practice, and ahead of his third season at the helm, Jedd Fisch seemed pleased with the results.
“Guys played and competed their ass off,” he said after the Huskies ran 120 plays. “That’s the type of day we want to have…We have a lot to work on, but we’re excited that today gave us this opportunity.”
The 120 plays had a little bit of everything, but the biggest thing the Huskies showed during the day was that, despite the inexperience that Fisch’s coaching staff is looking to lean on at several positions, there’s plenty of talent littering the roster. The best example of that is sophomore safety Paul Mencke Jr., who had his best practice in a Husky uniform after Fisch announced on Saturday that senior CJ Christian is out for the year after suffering a torn Achilles tendon during Tuesday’s practice at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center.
“Paul’s done a great job of competing and being physical and playing fast, and you could see over these three years, he’s really grown into understanding now the system, and what’s asked of him as a safety,” Fisch said. “I think there’s a lot of in him that he wants to be like (safeties coach Taylor) Mays. He sees himself as a tall, linear, big hitter. So when you have your coach that is known for that type of play, I think Paul has done a great job.”
Mencke was all over the field. Not only did he lay some big hits, just like his safeties coach did during his time at USC, but the former four-star recruit also tallied a pair of pass breakups, an interception in a 7-on-7 period, and multiple strong tackles to hold ball carriers to limited yards.
While the defense did a good job getting pressure throughout the day and making the quarterbacks hold the ball with different looks on the back end, with safety Alex McLaughlin, linebacker Donovan Robinson, and edge rusher Logan George all among the players credited for a sack, quarterback Demond Williams Jr. got an opportunity to show off how he’s improved ahead of his junior year.
Early on, he showed off his well-known speed and athleticism, making the correct decision on a read option, pulling the ball and scampering for a 25-yard gain before displaying his touch. Throughout the day, his favorite target was junior receiver Rashid Williams, whom he found on several layered throws of 15-plus yards in the various scrimmage periods of practice.
On a day when every able-bodied member of the team was able to get several reps of live action, here are some of the other noteworthy plays from the day.
Spring practice notebook
- Freshman cornerback Jeron Jones was unable to participate in the scrimmage and was spotted working off to the side with the rest of the players rehabbing their injuries.
- The running backs delivered a pair of big blows on the day. First, cornerback Emmanuel Karnley was on the receiving end of a big hit from redshirt freshman Quaid Carr before the former three-star recruit ripped off a 13-yard touchdown run on the next play. Later on, every player on offense had a lot of fun cheering on freshman Ansu Sanoe after he leveled Zaydrius Rainey-Sale, letting the sophomore linebacker hear all about it when the play was whistled dead.
- Sophomore wide receiver Justice Williams put together a strong day with several contested catches, showing off his strong hands and 6-foot-4 frame, including a 25-yard catch and run off a drag route from backup quarterback Elijah Brown.
- Of all the tackles for a loss the Huskies were able to rack up throughout the day, two stood out. First, junior defensive tackle Elinneus Davis burst through the middle of the line to wrap up freshman running back Brian Bonner. Later on, freshman outside linebacker Ramzak Fruean wasn’t even touched as he shot through a gap in the offensive line to track down a play from behind, letting the entire offensive sideline know about the play on his way back to his own bench.
- The Huskies experimented with several defensive line combinations on Saturday, and for the first time this spring, it felt like freshman Derek Colman-Brusa took the majority of his reps alongside someone other than Davis, who he said has taken on an older brother role to help mentor the top-ranked in-state prospect in the 2026 class.
“Elinneus is a phenomenal guy. Great work ethic. He’s kind of taken on that older brother mentor for me. He’s been a great help just to learn plays and learn the scheme. Can’t say enough good things about the guy.”
- Ball State transfer Darin Conley took a handful of reps with the first team, while rotating with Colman-Brusa, who got a lot of work in alongside Sacramento State transfer DeSean Watts.
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