Police speak to Wayne Rooney over phone hacking

Police speak to Wayne Rooney over phone hacking

Published Apr. 28, 2011 5:12 p.m. ET

England and Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney has been contacted by police after his mobile phone was apparently hacked into by a British tabloid newspaper.

The move comes amid a high-profile London police investigation into the News of the World's role in a series of illegal interceptions into celebrities' phone voicemails.

''Scotland Yard detectives came to see me earlier and showed me some documents, looks like a newspaper have hacked into my phone,'' Rooney said Thursday on his Twitter account.

London police said they would not comment on Rooney's case.

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The News of the World has acknowledged that the practice of illegal hacking was more widespread than it had maintained when two employees were jailed in 2007 for eavesdropping on voicemail messages of royal employees.

The paper has had three journalists detained recently for questioning and said it will pay compensation for an unspecified number of ''justifiable claims.''

Wayne Rooney has regularly seen allegations about his private life splashed across British newspapers.

''Newspapers hacking into phones!! Desperate and Disgusting!!!!'' Rooney's wife Coleen wrote on her own Twitter account.

The News of the World has already paid 700,000 pounds ($1.2 million) to Gordon Taylor, the chief executive of the Professional Footballers' Association, to settle a hacking case against the paper.

The News of the World is owned by News International Ltd., which is a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp.

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