Final Edition

NotW Editor Describes ‘Desperate’ End

Couldn’t get charities to take proceeds.

Former News of the World defense editor Paul McNamara wrote a bitter first-person account of the final days of the newspaper that Rupert Murdoch shuttered in the wake of the phone-hacking scandal. On a British warship firing missiles into Libya when he got the news, McNamara said his boss told him “it couldn’t be much worse, son … Get home.” He returned home on July 8 and was greeted with a meeting by News International executive and former News of the World editor, Rebekah Brooks. His colleagues asked her, “Why are you staying while we leave?” and “What’s the tax on my buyout?” McNamara was given the task of distributing the final edition's profits to various charities, but it took 24 hours to find three that were willing to accept a hearty $1.5 million from the soiled publication.