Published at 11:28, Wednesday, 25 April 2012

The depressing trail of media misconduct snakes ever more deeply into British life and public office, as the long-running Leveson Inquiry continues.

This week it emerged that a Sky News reporter hacked into the emails of suspected Carlisle child killer Lianne Smith, who is awaiting trial for murder in Spain.

Her paedophile partner Martin Smith, also from Carlisle, was found dead in prison in January, where he was serving 16 years for raping and abusing a young girl. His emails were also intercepted.

Revelations from this inquiry into media standards are beginning to lose their ability to shock, bringing instead disappointing resignation to the gutter behaviour of some national operators.

They do though, bring into sharp focus the clear and stark distance between local and national press – one always answerable to its community, the other seemingly answerable to no one.

The Leveson Inquiry was called to investigate media methods, ethics and standards, following the News Of The World phone hacking scandal.

Since then its reach has grown ever longer and repeatedly testimony of dubious practice has led back to government doors.

Today as one minister resists resignation calls, Rupert Murdoch takes the stand, poised to embroil senior politicians yet further in what they envisaged as an exposure of his organisation’s sins alone.

Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk