The Sun’s outspoken managing editor Richard Caseby is understood to be leaving News UK (formerly News International) after 24 years with the company.
Press Gazette understands that he was spotted in meetings with HR last week and insiders believe he is leaving the business.
There has been no official announcement to staff as yet and in response to questions about the status of Caseby, a News UK spokesperson said: "Any announcements about senior appointments are communicated formally to the relevant staff".
Caseby’s apparent exit comes a week after David Dinsmore was made editor of The Sun.
Caseby was managing editor of The Sunday Times for 13 years before being made joint managing editor of The Sun and the News of the World by then chief executive Rebekah Brooks at the end of June 2011. This was just weeks before the hacking scandal erupted with The Guardian revelation that the News of the World had listened to the phone-messages of missing schoolgirl Milly Dowler.
Caseby was replaced in that job on an interim basis for 11 months by Dinsmore from December 2011, as he worked full-time on dealing with News International’s response to the Leveson Inquiry.
In his job as managing editor Caseby has been an at times forthright defender of News International journalism, as the examples below illustrate.
False hope claim
In December 2011 The Guardian added clarifications to 37 stories, at the insistence of Caseby, which retracted an assertion made in the original Milly Dowler phone-hacking story of July 2011 – that News of the World journalists deleted messages from the mobile phone of the missing schoolgirl giving her family false hope that she was alive.
Marina Hyde and the toilet roll
In November 2011, Guardian journalist Marina Hyde falsely reported on the paper’s front page that a journalist for The Sun had doorstepped one of the Leveson Inquiry lawyers. She said that this was tantamount to 'casually defecating on his lordship's desk while doing a thumbs-up sign".
Caseby posted Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger a toilet roll along with a note saying: “I hear Marina Hyde's turd landed on your desk." The Guardian later published an apology for its mistake.
Page Three 'Scrubbers'
In February this year he was furious about a column by Guardian journalist Marina Hyde which ‘channelled’ Rupert Murdoch (as the paper later said). She suggested that Rupert Murdoch wanted a “better class of tit” for The Sun’s Page Three, rather than “Downmarket Scrubbers”. Caseby accused The Guardian of “post-modern cowardice” .
Guardian 'sexed up hacking investigation'
In December 2011, Caseby told the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Privacy Injunctions that it was “now clear that Alan Rusbridger has effectively sexed up his investigation into phone-hacking and the wider issue of wrongdoing in the media”. He was referring the Milly Dowler false hope allegation.
Gordon Brown health records apology
In July 2011, Caseby secured another apology from The Guardian over its front-page report claiming that The Sun had accessed the medical records of former prime minister Gordon Brown’s infant son.
Nick Davies' knitting
In February 2008, Caseby hit back at Guardian journalist Nick Davies over his book Flat Earth News which included a chapter on the Sunday Times which described the “long, slow demise of truth-telling at the paper”.
Caseby told Press Gazette:“'Davies is wrong on so much it's hard to know where to begin. His book is an example of the shoddiest knitting I've ever come across. Pull one thread and the whole garment falls apart.'
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