Kate Middleton’s bank account’ hacked

The Duchess of Cambridge had her bank details hacked by a private detective serving for a scandalous newspaper, it was said.

Her account was accessed in 2005, when she was the girlfriend of Prince William, by Jonathan Rees, a private prosecutor who once served for the News of the World, it was claimed.

Other glamorous personalities said to have been targets for Mr. Rees, who was cleared of murder previous this year, include Tony Blair, Jack Straw, the Duke and Duchess of Kent and John Yates, the Metropolitan Police assistant commissioner who once started the phone hacking investigation.

The charges were made after Mr. Rees was named by Tom Watson MP. He told the House of Commons yesterday that Scotland Yard had witness against the prosecutor but has said it goes down outside the extent of their prosecution.

Detectives at Scotland Yard are understood to have been in contact with the Duchess of Cambridge to inform her that her bank accounts may have been accessed. On Wednesday night the Met verified it had obtained “a number of charges” and the force was thinking inquiring.

It is sure that the reasons of the charges drop outside the range of the inquiry, criticized Operation Weeting, is because they do not link to phone hacking, but other aspects of unlawful interference.

A St James’s Palace spokesman said they were not in a position to give remarks.

This year in March, Mr. Rees was cleared of the murder of Daniel Morgan, who was found with a knife in his head in a pub car park on March 10, 1987.

After his release, it was revealed that Mr. Rees, who was a private prosecutor for Southern Investigations — the company established by Mr. Morgan, had engaged with several media channels.

In 1999, Mr. Rees was punished to seven years in jail for planning to plant cocaine on a woman.

After his discharge in May 2004, the News of the World appointed him under the editorship of Andy Coulson, who went on to become David Cameron’s media consultant.

It is in the following year that Mr. Rees is asserted to have accessed the Duchess of Cambridge’s bank account details.

Last night, Mr. Rees’s solicitor did not reacted to enquiries from The Daily Telegraph.

A Met spokesman added: “Since January 2011 the Metropolitan Police has got several charges relating break of privacy which fall outside the remit of Operation Weeting.

These contentions are presently being measured.”

A spokesman for News International, the News of the World’s parent company, said: “It is well recognized that Jonathan Rees and Southern Investigations worked for an entire diversity of newspaper groups.

With regards to Tom Watson’s precise accusations, we think these are completely wrong. The Met Police, with whom we are assisting entirely in Operation Weeting, have not asked us for any information regarding Jonathan Rees.

“Tom Watson MP made these intentions under parliamentary freedom.