The civil trial against the Mirror Group began this week. This is Prince Harry’s lawsuit against the publisher of the Daily Mirror, a British tabloid on which Piers Morgan served as editor in chief from 1995 to 2004. It was during that time period that Morgan oversaw a large-scale phone hacking operation on royals, celebrities and victims of crime. Not only did he oversee the operation, he lied about it when questioned during the Leveson Inquiry years later, just as he continues to lie and obfuscate to this day. Prince Harry’s lawyer is David Sherborne, who (by the sound of it) must be dedicating his practice to Harry’s media-specific litigation. Sherborne’s new legal filings show just how prevalent the phone-hacking operation was and just how often Piers Morgan bragged about it:
Piers Morgan knew about illegal phone hacking when he was editor of the Daily Mirror, it has been alleged at the high court. The first day of the phone-hacking trial initiated by Prince Harry and other well-known figures heard claims that illegal activity, including voicemail interception, was “carried out on an industrial scale” by staff at Mirror newspapers.
David Sherborne, the barrister acting for Harry and the other alleged victims, told the court that Morgan “must have known” about illegal behaviour at the newspaper he edited between 1995 and 2004.
The former Daily Mirror political editor David Seymour told the court that staff at the newspaper heard Morgan openly discussing how phone hacking operated when at a dinner with executives. Having worked closely with the editor for a decade, he alleged Morgan was “unreliable and boastful, and apt to tell untruths when it suited him”.
The veteran political journalist recalled an incident in which Morgan obtained a voicemail left by Paul McCartney, in which the singer sang a Beatles song to Heather Mills as part of an attempt to patch up their relationship. According to the legal filings: “Mr Seymour recalls that he was walking through the newsroom one day, likely in March 2001, and Mr Morgan was standing in the middle with a group of reporters around him holding a tape machine, and played the message to all present a number of times, laughing mockingly. Mr Seymour recalls that the Beatles song played by Mr McCartney was actually And I Love Her.”
Benjamin Wegg-Prosser, a former Downing Street official, recalled going for dinner at a Chinese restaurant with Morgan during the Labour party conference in September 2002. During the meal, Wegg-Prosser asked Morgan how the Daily Mirror had obtained a story about an affair between the then England football manager Sven-Göran Eriksson and the television presenter Ulrika Jonsson, according to the court filings.
The legal filings say: “Mr Morgan asked Mr Prosser which network provider he used for his mobile phone and then told him the default pin for that network, and then explained that the default pin numbers were well known and rarely changed, which is how mobile phone messages could be accessed remotely. He then said, with a smile, that the story on Mr Eriksson and Ms Jonsson was obtained through that method.”
The journalist Omid Scobie claims he heard Morgan discussing the use of voicemails when he was a journalism student doing work experience on the Mirror’s entertainment desk in 2002. “[Scobie] recalls during one of those days in the office the editor, Piers Morgan, came over to talk to someone about a story relating to Kylie Minogue and her boyfriend James Gooding. Mr Morgan asked how confident they were in the reporting, and was told that the information had come from voicemails,” legal filings state.
Yeah – again, the phone hacking was no secret. As these cases proceed, Harry is basically just going to redo the Leveson Inquiry all by himself. Piers Morgan and the Mirror hacked a lot of phones, as did News of the World, The Sun and the Mail. If you ask me, I think the Mail’s operation has outdone every other tabloid’s op post-Leveson. Anyway, I’m glad that Harry’s legal team seems to have all of the ducks in a row, and (to mix metaphors) it sounds like Piers Morgan’s goose is cooked. Hilariously, reporters accosted Piers outside his home yesterday, where he promptly raged about Prince Harry “invading his family’s privacy” and stormed into his home. I haven’t seen Piers Morgan move that fast since a Black weatherman suggested that he is an unhinged stalker on live television.
‘I’m not going to take lectures on privacy invasion from Prince Harry.’
Amid allegations of phone hacking while he was at the Mirror, Piers Morgan tells ITV News Harry should apologise to the royal family for ‘invasion of privacy he’s been perpetrating’https://t.co/P3RH5guPSb pic.twitter.com/4uGvezu5y6
— ITV News (@itvnews) May 10, 2023
Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Piers Morgan invited friends and family to his pub in Kensington for his annual Xmas Party. The booze was totally free all night, and Piers appeared rather worse for wear as he left the venue at midnight. Pictured: Piers Morgan BACKGRID USA 23 DECEMBER 2022 BYLINE MUST READ: Click News and Media / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Piers Morgan invited friends and family to his pub in Kensington for his annual Xmas Party. The booze was totally free all night, and Piers appeared rather worse for wear as he left the venue at midnight. Pictured: Piers Morgan BACKGRID USA 23 DECEMBER 2022 BYLINE MUST READ: Click News and Media / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince Harry pictured leaving the Royal Court of Justice in London. Pictured: Prince Harry BACKGRID USA 27 MARCH 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: Mario Pietrangeli / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince Harry pictured leaving the Royal Court of Justice in London. Pictured: Prince Harry BACKGRID USA 27 MARCH 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: Mario Pietrangeli / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Howrah, INDIA – March 30, 2023, London, England, United Kingdom: Prince HARRY, Duke of Sussex, leaves the High Courts after attending the 4th day of the privacy case preliminary hearing against Associated Newspapers. (Credit Image: © Thomas Krych/ZUMA Press Wire) Pictured: 20230330_zip_k172_004.jpg BACKGRID USA 30 MARCH 2023 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication* Pictured: Prince Harry
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- London, UNITED KINGDOM – Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex attends the Royal Courts of Justice as the lawsuit against Associated Newspapers enters its final day on March 30, 2023 in London, England. Prince Harry is one of several claimants in a lawsuit against Associated Newspapers, publisher of the Daily Mail. Pictured: Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex BACKGRID USA 30 MARCH 2023 BYLINE MUST READ: MediaPunch / BACKGRID USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
I wonder if the RF are going to support him publicly still, because Piers is not one to take rejection or go quietly so they better be careful how they throw him under the bus.
They won’t say a word about this. They’re still pretending like Jeremy Clarkson never happened.
I wonder this too. I doubt they will publicly say anything, but it’s possible behind the scenes. If he has info they don’t want to get out, they may try to help him avoid jail. Totally illegal but we know self-preservation comes first with them.
Remember the Queen stepping in when Paul Burrell was on trial!
@unstrungpearl they do that, even those who didn’t know (or care) would be able to see that Harry was right about everything. Either way you slice it, both parties (the BM and the BRF) are f*cked and we love that for them.
I suspect they’re just going to stop taking his calls.
I’m sure Piers is throwing a fit trying to make it all stop by threatening all sorts of things. But, usually, someone like the Queen would negotiate a quiet settlement and everyone would play along. But Harry ain’t playing no more. They can’t convince him to do anything.
This should be interesting to see how desperate Piers gets.
Didn’t Piers get a new job here in the states again? Wonder if that dissepears.
This may explain why Beatrice publicly kissed Pis Morgan.
Herself and her mother are desperate to keep him on side and want to be sure that if and when he goes down their secrets are safe with him.
There is no other reason for that public kissing display. She probably hates him.
@obert Phillips, I don’t believe it’s a new job. I might be misremembering but I thought I read that when he joined back up with Murdoch & GB news, that included him doing stuff for the NY Post and other Murdoch owned publications/media. A quick search doesn’t show a new job. There have been some rather curious posters on SM and here saying such a thing about a “new” job.
I’m saying, if it’s with a Murdoch owned situation-it’s not a new thing. same ‘ol shite
Apologies, not @obert(fast typing)-meant @Robert.
I have a small theory about why Eugenie and Beatrice still need to truck with him: I bet he holds coverage of their dad over their heads.
Eugenie and Beatrice need to accept that their dad is deeply problematic and stop trying to protect him.
I agree but I just speculate that this is why they still hang out with the guy.
They also NEED reporters to throw out positive stories about their father, so he will be able to rehabilitate his image, just like cams.
It’s just amazing to me that this man is still welcome in polite society and was even invited to that luncheon at all. Even if we hadn’t seen B hugging him, whoTF wants to be seen publicly with this disgraced POS??
Absolutely.
The York sisters must have known that Pis Morgan was about to get into trouble, and that need to make sure he doesn’t spill anything about him.
He’s such a toolbox, running scared. Good. Now he knows why Harry hates him so much–why Meghan allegedly ghosted him (I get it–that meeting probably never happened). He’s banking on Camilla backing him up. After all, she did plenty of leaking to him and others herself, as we well know. But he’s terrified about having been fully found out–with witnesses–that he was involved in the hacking and lied about it for years. Hope this leads to jail time.
Harry’s got the goods on this guy, and I’m loving it.
Piers Morgan complaining about his privacy being invaded is so Piers Morgan.
He’s an odious, bloated toad.
@fishface, you are being too kind. P*ss Morgan is a blobfish of codswallop. If that visual isn’t enough – combine it with a star nosed mole-and we have a good image of P*ss Morgan.
You have to laugh at his response to the question. Major deflection. Ooh Piers, you don’t want to discuss things that actually are of public interest like your phone hacking. MFer.
Oh no! His privacy is being invaded? PERFECT!
What an idiot. Does he not understand that writing about something that is your own lived experience is different from illegally obtaining information from someone else’s phone or just think that everyone else is that stupid?
And I’m not invading your privacy if I tell people you did something terrible to me. That’s an abuser’s defense all the way. I just hear Celie’s dad from The Color Purple saying you better not tell nobody but God.
Right. When I read this, it’s Alanis Morissette’s Hand’s Clean-or I’ve preferred to call it, Under Rug Swept. It’s what the BRF/BM have done and do.
Piers Morgan does look completely rattled (as he should). That he’s been in this game for so long and his response was this. lofl. Along with tweeting out a clip from South Park. Morgan really doesn’t know.
Day one the Mirror Group apologized and threw Piss Moron under the bus.
So far not much coverage in England but never mind the Foreign Press is there to pickup the slack.
Piers Morgan deserves everything that comes to him. So so glad Harry and the others are pursuing this.
On a wider note, a lot of the media that were phone hacking are connected to infamous cases such as Daniel Morgan. Highly recommend reading up on this for wider context, it links the tabloids to Met police corruption going back decades. I wonder if any information on other cases will come out in the trial…
May PM receive his just portion.
Amen.
Oh Piers, it’s awful, being staked out media, isn’t it?
But you’re a public person, so that’s the media’s right, isn’t? And you have worked on the principle that anyone close to a public person is public as well?
Well: reap what you sow, Piers!
I’m pretty sure David is the same lawyer Harry met at Elton’s house who asked ‘why didn’t Harry get his own lawyer’. It was his vast knowledge of what the media did that convinced Harry to move with his lawsuits.
I think so, also. He is also just a renowned media law specialist in Britain who has represented hundreds of parties in libel and other actions.
Maybe Eyes-a-poppin Beatrice and Queen Side chick Cams can be piss support system In the courtroom.
Don’t forget Eugenie! 😉
I think the jig is up for PM, Beatrice and Queen Concubine notwithstanding. I exclude Eugenie from this because she didn’t stay at the luncheon, she left either just before or just after PM showed up. In any event, as many have learned, you don’t f*ck the BRF, secret agreements or not. If he unleashes the hounds on them they have the might and the money to ruin him and take all the other complicit tabloids down with him — this is war.
Eugenie actually looked kind of pissed off, I think she was ambushed by Piers.
eyes-a-poppin beatrice? seriously?
wondering what over it looks like?? you dont make fun of someone just because you can…….try again….over it……..
Of course he knew about the phone hacking.
When he gave evidence about it at the Leveson enquiry the judge said his testimony was not believable – imagine being called a liar by a JUDGE!!
He knows what he did and as usual is trying to front his way out of it – he is blackmailing people at this point.
He is such a dangerous person. Ruthless.
I can not understand how the RF got mixed up with these types , seems very risky to start with leaking and phone tappings and favours with media etc. It was bound to blow up in all of their faces at some point.
aaahhh, now reading this post, it finally makes sense to me , his bitter and unhinged column of a few days ago, in the New York Post…
The post is bad enough but.giving a bitter piers a platform to rant about Meghan and harry could doom the post.
One can only hope!
These guys can dish it out, but they sure can’t take it. Couldn’t be happening to a nicer guy.
{popcorn on deck}
Morgan is such a malignant whiny snowflake. He demonstrates again and again that he can’t handle even a fraction of what he dishes out to others. If he didn’t want the negative spotlight or to have his life ruined, he shouldn’t have lived the way he has. It must suck to know that a good part of the world is laughing with glee over your impending doom. Shrug.
Thank you, Omid Scobie, way to go Harry, and I’m going to listen to “And I Love Her” later. Piss M is about to experience FAFO.
I telya, the thought of Paul McCartney singing And I Love Her to me on the phone gives me the chills. Oooh, I mean, can you imagine??
Yeah, it’s great how Piers was playing that for people, laughing and mocking it, when in reality it’s an adorable story and most women would love to get that voicemail from Paul! Piers is the one who comes out of that anecdote looking bad, not Paul McCartney. Absolutely deranged.
Of course he knew and encouraged it. I wouldn’t be surprised if he is STILL blackmailing celebs to this day over what he learned doing that.
I still can’t believe he’s still given a platform.
Maybe he blackmailed the Murdochs into giving him said platform.
I didn’t know Harry’s lawyers produced corroborating witnesses. No wonder Pus is panicking. The shootouts to the BRF is really a veiled threat: if I go down I’m taking you with me.
I hope his downfall is also the brf’s downfall! Justice would be served👏🏼👏🏼
I am expecting some big names to come out in support of Harry.
What a despicable man! His double chin irritates me!
He’s going to need to take it on both of his chins.
There are pampers diaper ads on this post for me, it’s hilarious
LOL! Awesome!!!
Piers Morgan has discussed and written about phone hacking in the past, including in HIS OWN writings and in numerous interviews. Dating back at least as early as 2003. And he described in detail how it is done in his memoir The Insider in 2005. So the idea that “he wouldn’t know how” to hack a phone is irrefutably a lie.
The Guardian came with receipts: https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/11/what-piers-morgan-knew-about-phone-hacking-in-his-own-words.
ps According to that article the Paul McCartney song was “We Can Work it Out”.
Of course Piers knew about the phone hacking. How can you run the newsroom but don’t know how your reporters get their stories? Tell that lie to an 8 years old and they will laugh you in your face.
Everybody who enters a (centuries old) corporate job has to work by the company’s standard practices/rules/regulations and the guidance from management/the leaders. The salaried and freelance reporters were working with – among others to obtain (illegal) information – private investigators, in a scoops, breaking news and celebrity gossiping driven industry. How were these people payed? Who was signing off their invoices, and for what exactly? Why do news papers feel the need to work with PI-s anyway?
Piers and many of these lowlife ‘journalists’, are going down between now and 1.5 year, that’s for sure.
Yep, Piers Morgan fully understood the phone hacking business. Prior to working for the Mirror Group, he worked for Murdoch’s News of the World. Morgan was with the Mirror Group from 1995? – May 2004. Yes, the fake torture photos did him in with MGN. I’m more interested in timelines. Per this chart, on the Mirror Group’s expenditures on paying PI’s, 2005 was the climax. What was happening in 2005? Well, C&C got married in April 2005. Harry went/left for the RMA in May of 2005 for 44 weeks?.
The $$$$ spent on PI’s increased between 2004 and 2005. Then dropped significantly between 2005 and 2006. I’m SURE it’s a mere coincidence that the Mirror Group’s PI dollars spent dropped when Harry entered a more private situation like the army.https://twitter.com/arusbridger/status/1656293614324965377
Royal Suitors’ twitter has great information on all of this.
https://twitter.com/royal_suitor?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
Hi hi hi! GO HARRY!
After the Leveson Inquiry they did not even set up an independent government funded Press Regulator . Instead the Press was allowed to setup a press funded IPSO where membership is on a voluntary basis.
All these multimillionaires journalists like Piers and Clarkson were left unchecked
The PISS is discovering the real definition of FAFO. He volunteered as the under the bus rider for a OBE. A person with this much shit to hide would not have kept kicking the hornets nests for the past 5 years. I guess his royal insider told him he has nothing to fear because they will control Prince Harry by any means necessary.
I just wish Harry could give his testamony via zoom. Its going to be very dangerous for him in England.
May the courts bleed Piers DRY. Ramen.
I want Morgan to lose everything, his job,reputation, friends ,money ,health everything.
He deserves to suffer the way he has made other people suffer .
I want him to publicly apologise to all his victims .
He is despicable .
At this point PM has to be on his 8th life given his career track record.
This might just be the thing that take him out of the game economically and socially.
Socially? I think that will depend on if royal names stay out of it or not. Part of the deal is his keeping their reputations unsullied.
He has always been disgusting and this is not the first time they’ve tried to hold him to account for the phone hacking done when he was editor – he has a lot of dirt on a lot of people which is why he gets away with it. He’s worse the Wootton.
He won’t got down on his own as he is soo the type to take others with him.
One of the things that came out of the hearing yesterday that NO ONE in the UK media is touching is that the papers lawyers ADMITTED that some of the stories came from RF members themselves and their aides. When it goes to trial they will be forced to reveal who the leakers are in court – not that it will be made public but Harry will be able to find out who was selling him and Meghan out. The fact that they admitted it and then apologies means he has the proof to expose them. He’s not going to take a pay out like his brother – his end game is accountability and change.
@digitalunicorn, hell yes, but I do wonder if someone who said she hates flying and overseas trips will suddenly take off on one ✈️✈️. And piss, you walked like a duck, you quacked like a duck, so guess what, I hope you like orange Sauce 😁
@digitalunicorn, why wouldn’t the names of the RF leakers be made public, if the names are going to come out in court? Wouldn’t it become a matter of public record?
The name of Jude law’s leaker wasn’t revealed in open court. It was only described as a ‘close relative’. Jude was handed the name on a piece of paper
I haven’t read Spare (yet) so correct me if I’m wrong. Right after Philip ‘s funeral one of Charles and William ‘s biggest concern was if Harry was still suing the tabloids. Later that year they sort of severe their ties with Michael Fawcett and Jason Knauf. Yes there was the bag of cash scandal but it could have been because of the lawsuit too.
Piers is clearly rattled about this, and so he should be. FINALLY.
Why didn’t Paul McCartney ever sue these bastards?
Because he had a lot to hide with regards to his former wife Heather Mills and her background. He used his press contacts to make the stories about her past (allegedly she was a hooker at one point) go away – her first husband and former boyfriends confirmed she was a compulsive liar and fantasist.
Hmmm, I see. She turned out to be a real piece of work, didn’t she?
Prince Harry is one brave soul-to think these shitstains was spying on Harry every since he was a child-then a teen- then into adulthood-God give grace to Harry and his family-no wonder poor Diana did not stand a chance-to have some members of the royal family working with these vultures in the media is mind blowing-tell me again how this shows love in a family-these people don’t love anybody-KIng Charles and anyone else believes this is love are deranged individuals. there is a deep vile sickness around the royal family and in it which the disgusting media uses to its advantage to cause harm and hurt to all who do not tow the line. I get teary thinking about Harry’s mother and how very awful the UK press and the royal family made her life a living nightmare.
If I live to be a hundred, I will never forget the absolutely terrifying video of Diana walking through an airport while hounded by paparazzi, desperately shielding her face with a tennis racquet while “journalists” snatched at the thing, trying to get her to put it down so they could shove cameras in her face. When she got to an elevator, one of them even tried to shove his way in. No shame, those tabloid trolls …
🍾 a toast to hopefully watching PM get everything he deserves.
This just in: Prince Harry cannot perpetrate any invasion of privacy on the BRF … because he is a member of the BRF.
Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.
Thank you for putting that so plainly, Rapunzel.
I had that same thought when I heard Piss Morgan’s whiny, sanctimonious B.S.
Oh My God, Rapunzel! Nailed it. Thank you for your TED Talk.
Such a shame this is only a civil suit. It would give me everlasting life to see Piss Moron convicted of criminal charges. But seeing him pay compensation to Harry and the others will still bring a lot of joy.
It’s such a fitting punishment for Piers – I hope he’s going to find out that his high-placed friends and the many favours he may have built up over the years don’t amount to anything now that he’s suddenly vulnerable. It will be interesting to see who, if anyone, will be willing to defend him or if suddenly his calls go straight to voicemail.
He will soon find out, just as Ghislaine Maxwell did, that royal ‘friends’ are firmly in the fair-weather category.
I feel so sorry for Harry because while it is despicable to be phone hacked etc by creepy Morgan , can you imagine the distress of being betrayed by your own family willing to trade you for good press? Deep sigh, I am so glad they got out in 2019 despite all the crap, they are well and thriving in America.
I wish Meghan could make some sort of comment like ‘I’m sure a lot of women can relate to a man you don’t know acting as if he has some sort of authority over your life including stalking you. It’s a really scary situation because you have to wonder just how deranged they are.’
I don’t actively root for misfortune on others, but when it comes to Piers Morgan, I’m an entire SuperBowl full of hope: I hope that awful, odious, malignant, entitled, and entirely horrible, horrible man gets jail and social ruin, and is financially obliged to pay the people whose suffering he profited from.
GO HARRY GO!
Question for the lawyer types… If there is solid evidence that PM knew about the illegal hacking, does that mean he can be tried for perjury (or the UK equivalent) because his testimony during the Levenson inquiry was a straight up lie? I’m assuming he was under oath (or the UK equivalent) during that time.
I don’t want just monetary and reputational damage to the odious MF’er (and his precious precious rag). I want jail time.
@LynnInTx – I’ve watched some of the Levenson videos on YouTube and whilst PM himself does not admit to hacking, other witnesses such as Jeremy Paxton go on the record to give evidence of PM admitting to hacking and even telling them how it was done.
At one point Jeremy Paxton gives evidence to the effect that PM and his cronies knew that most people did not change their voicemail passwords, which was how they were able to hack into Milly Dowelr’s phone.
Re the perjury question – yes with solid evidence he’d be guilty but it would have to be a literal smoking gun at this point which I think is unlikely given the clean up operation the Murdoch and News International empire has done. Note also that Rebecca Brooks was largely insulated and did not end up going to prison.
The more we learn about this violation of privacy, the more I am tempted to look at it as organized crime, with Piers Morgan as the chief hoodlum, main coordinator at its head. The man has been illegally spying on people, violating their intimacy, unpunished like a Sicilian godfather.
Sorry, but what Piers Morgan did for years is an act of terror. This type of behavior coming from someone as sanctimonious as his raggedy boar-looking person, demonstrates a highly inflated view of himself and his power.
I am wondering to which extent the meeting with the York girls in the wake of the trial, was meant to discuss strategic moves.
Karma is coming down hard on these idiots.