Andy Coulson, David Cameron’s former communications director, taken into custody for perjury
Andy Coulson, former editor of News of the World, is being detained for questioning about his testimony in the perjury trial of socialist politician Tommy Sheridan.
Andy Coulson, the 44-year-old former communications director for British Prime Minister David Cameron, was taken into custody Wednesday morning by British police on suspicion of perjury, the UK Press Association reported.
Coulson was detained in London and brought to Govan police station in Glasgow, where he will be questioned about the testimony he gave during the 2010 trial of former member of Scottish Parliament Tommy Sheridan, according to the UKPA.
Sheridan, who was on trial for perjury at the time, claimed that The News of the World (where Coulson was formerly the editor before he left his post in 2007) illegally intercepted his cell phone's voice mail messages, the New York Times reported.
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Coulson insisted during the Sheridan trial that his News of the World reporters worked within the law and denied that police officers had been paid for information, the Associated Press reported. He said he "did not accept there was a culture of phone hacking" at the tabloid, according to the AP.
Police told reporters that the former communications director would be questioned for 12 hours in Glasgow, after which he would either be released or formally charged with perjury, according to the Times.
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Sheridan, who served a year of his sentence before being released, said he now hopes to have his conviction quashed, the Associated Press reported.
"We were led to believe by Mr. Coulson and his acolytes at News International during my trial and the initial phone-hacking investigations that the problem was a rogue reporter," Sheridan told reporters outside his home. "Well, I think we all know now that there is no bad apple in the barrel. What there is is a rotten orchard full of bad apples."
Coulson appeared before the Leveson Inquiry on May 10, testifying that there was no "grand conspiracy" between Rupert Murdoch's News Corp media empire and the Conservative party in Britain, Agence France Presse reported.
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