Rebekah Brooks denies tabloid phone hacking cover up

LONDON (AP) — Former News of the World editor Rebekah Brooks has denied covering up the wide extent of phone hacking at the newspaper.

Brooks told a jury at London's Central Criminal Court that the newspaper's claim — repeated over several years — that hacking was the work of a single rogue reporter "was believed to be true at the time."

Private investigator Glenn Mulcaire and News of the World royal reporter Clive Goodman were jailed in 2007 for eavesdropping on the voicemails of royal aides. The newspaper maintained they were the only employees involved, but that claim dissolved in 2011 when the scale of the newspaper's eavesdropping began to emerge.

Brooks and six others deny charges of phone hacking and related wrongdoing.

Brooks was being cross-examined Wednesday by prosecution lawyer Andrew Edis.