Piers Morgan has accused Heather Mills of illegally hacking her ex-husband's phone in an ongoing spat connected to the recent News of the World privacy scandal.
The former U.K. tabloid editor has been dragged into the controversy by Mills after she claimed her phone was hacked by a Daily Mirror representative in 2001, when Morgan was the editor of the newspaper.
In a BBC interview last week (03Aug11), Mills alleged a senior journalist at the Mirror called her in 2001 and relayed a message verbatim that the former Beatle had left on her voicemail.
Morgan later wrote in a 2006 column about an unspecified person playing him a "heartbreaking" phone message McCartney had left Mills after a fight, detailing how the star sang his hit We Can Work It Out to her.
The former glamour model is adamant that hacking is the only way Morgan could have heard the tape - but the journalist-turned-TV personality insists her claims are "unsubstantiated".
In a statement, Morgan said, "Heather Mills has made unsubstantiated claims about a conversation she may or may not have had with a senior executive from a Trinity Mirror newspaper in 2001. The BBC has confirmed to me that this executive was not employed by the Daily Mirror."
And now Morgan has stirred up the feud further after learning McCartney believes his phone was hacked, by reminding the public Mills has already been accused of hacking McCartney's phone - by the ex-Beatle himself.
During an appearance on U.S. show Conan on Monday night (08Aug11), Morgan reiterated he has never hacked anyone's phone and said, "Paul McCartney is apparently now claiming that somebody hacked his phone - the police have told him that.
"I suspect it was Heather Mills because... if you study the divorce papers, Paul McCartney accused Heather then of hacking into his phones and passing information to the papers."
Morgan has vehemently denied taking part in Britain's phone-hacking scandal, which prompted media mogul Rupert Murdoch and his son James to shut down the News of the World last month (Jul11) amid allegations a private investigator working for the newspaper had illegally accessed voicemail messages belonging to celebrities, royals and crime victims.
The newsman, who was also editor of the Sunday tabloid, insists he would be happy to return to Britain to help the police as they investigate ongoing claims of privacy breaches.
He says, "If I need to, I'm happy to. I've nothing to hide at all."
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