Leveson Inquiry hears 'no phone hacking' at Express

Express Newspapers found no evidence of phone hacking in an internal investigation, its head of legal affairs told the Leveson Inquiry. Nicole Patterson, legal adviser to the Daily Express, Sunday Express, Daily Star and Daily Star Sunday, said the probe looked back as far as 2000. She told the inquiry Express Newspapers had spent £115,000 on search agents over 10 years. This compared to £9m spent on pictures in 2008. The inquiry, at the Royal Courts of Justice in central London, is hearing evidence from staff at Northern and Shell - including Daily Express and Daily Star owner Richard Desmond and two of his editors. The inquiry's focus this week has been on newspaper editors and executives. When asked about the group's internal investigation into phone hacking and blagging, Ms Patterson replied: "We haven't found any evidence to suggest that anybody was doing any phone hacking or anything of that nature." Paparazzi checks On Tuesday, it heard evidence relating to the Financial Times, Independent and Telegraph broadsheets, while Monday's evidence concentrated on the Sun. On Wednesday, the Daily Mail's picture editor Paul Silva told how the paper had introduced a series of checks before deciding whether to use photos taken by the paparazzi. These included whether the subjects were in a public place, whether they had been harassed and what lens had been used, he said. Prime Minister David Cameron established the Leveson Inquiry in July 2011 amid new revelations of phone hacking at the now-shut down News of the World (NoW) tabloid. A second phase of the inquiry will commence after the conclusion of a police investigation into NoW phone hacking and any prosecutions. It will examine the extent of unlawful conduct by the press and look at the police's initial hacking investigation.