Rebekah Brooks emailed James Murdoch seeking “approval” for a draft Sun editorial switching allegiance from Labour in September 2009, a court heard.
The editorial was in advance of a speech Labour Party Conference in 2009 entitled “Labour’s lost it”.
The email was marked “for approval by JRM” referring to News Corporation executive James Murdoch.
Neil Saunders, defending Brooks said the editorial had been written ahead of the Labour party conference
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Detective Sergeant Hayley Broom told the Old Bailey that she was responsible for reviewing materials found in bags in the car park of Rebekah and Charlie Brooks’ London apartment.
Broom told the court that an Apple laptop had been predominantly used by Charlie Brooks, although it included photographs of Rupert Murdoch in Corfu.
The laptop also had a novel which Charlie Brooks had been writing.
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However, a three-year budget plan for News International was also on the laptop and shown to the jury.
Justice Saunders removed the budget document from the screens after several minutes.
He said: “I don’t know how much of this is confidential.”
The laptop also contained footage of a practical joke and invoices for wine purchases.
Brooks, 44, of Churchill, Oxfordshire, is accused of conspiring to hack phones between 3 October 2000 and 9 August 2006, along with Coulson and News of the World managing editor Stuart Kuttner.
Former News of the World and Sun editor Brooks also faces two counts of conspiring with others to commit misconduct in public office – one between 1 January 2004 and 31 January 2012, and the other between 9 February 2006 and 16 October 2008 – linked to alleged inappropriate payments to public officials.
She also faces two allegations of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice – one with her former personal assistant Cheryl Carter, 49, of Chelmsford, Essex, between 6-9 July 2011, and a second with her husband, Charles Brooks, and former News International head of security Mark Hanna and others between 15 July and 19 July 2011.
Coulson, 46, of Charing, Kent, is also facing two allegations that he conspired with former NotW royal editor Clive Goodman, 56, from Addlestone in Surrey, and other unknown people to commit misconduct in public office between 31 August 2002 and 31 January 2003, and between 31 January and 3 June 2005.
All the defendants deny the charges against them.
The trial was adjourned until tomorrow.
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