Andy Coulson: Downing Street to Prison to Crisis Consultant

For a man whose job was once shaping how Britain’s leaders were seen, Andy Coulson has spent the past decade learning what happens when the story turns on you: he edited the News of the World, then became David Cameron’s Downing Street communications director in 2010, before a phone-hacking conviction sent him to prison and, within two years of leaving, saw him advising executives through his consultancy Coulson Partners. This is the story of that reinvention — and the questions it still raises.

Downing Street communications director: 2010–2011 ·
Editor, News of the World: 2003–2007 ·
Phone-hacking conviction: 2014 ·
Prison sentence: 18 months, released early ·
Coulson Partners founded: 2016 or 2017 ·
Podcast: Crisis What Crisis? since 2020

Eight facts, one pattern: Coulson’s public identity has been rewritten twice — first by scandal, then by reinvention.

The arc from Fleet Street to prison to boardroom advice is unusual even by the standards of British media scandals.

Who is Andy Coulson?

Andy Coulson’s biography splits into two acts: a rapid rise through Britain’s tabloid press to the centre of government, and a fall that ended in prison. Both halves are heavily documented, though a few details — including when his consultancy actually launched — remain contested.

What was Andy Coulson’s career before politics?

• Born: 21 January 1968 in Stone, Staffordshire (Encyclopaedia Britannica (reference encyclopedia))
• Editor, News of the World: 2003–2007 (Encyclopaedia Britannica (reference encyclopedia))
• Resigned January 2007 after phone-hacking controversy and royal correspondent Clive Goodman’s conviction (The Guardian (UK national newspaper))

He left the paper under a cloud, but not straight into retirement. After leaving the newspaper industry, Coulson became communications director of the Conservative Party and later carried that role into Downing Street when the party won power in 2010 (UK Government (official statement)).

What was Andy Coulson’s role at Downing Street?

He served as David Cameron’s Downing Street director of communications from 2010 until his resignation in January 2011, announced as scrutiny of the phone-hacking allegations intensified (UK Government (official statement)).

The pattern is a collision of two worlds: Coulson applied tabloid instincts inside government, and it worked until it didn’t. The political career lasted barely a year; the scandal that ended it followed him for years.

What has happened to Andy Coulson?

What happened to Andy Coulson is now a matter of court record: arrest, charge, trial and a conviction that sent him to prison. The sequence matters because each phase pulled the story further into the political mainstream.

What were the phone hacking allegations?

• Arrested on 8 July 2011 on suspicion of phone-hacking and corruption offences (BBC News (UK public broadcaster))
• Charged in July 2012 with conspiracy to intercept communications without lawful authority (Crown Prosecution Service (England’s prosecution authority))

The charges grew out of the News of the World’s practice of intercepting voicemails. What began as a tabloid scandal became a police investigation, then a prosecution of the paper’s most senior editors.

When was Andy Coulson convicted?

The trial at the Old Bailey began in October 2013 and involved former News of the World staff and executives (Courts and Tribunals Judiciary (official court records)). Coulson was found guilty, and on 4 July 2014 the court sentenced him to 18 months’ imprisonment for conspiracy to intercept communications without lawful authority (Courts and Tribunals Judiciary (official sentencing record)).

Separately, Coulson was charged with perjury in Scotland over evidence given in the Tommy Sheridan trial, and was acquitted on 3 June 2015 (BBC News (UK public broadcaster)).

What sentence did Andy Coulson receive?

The 18-month sentence, recorded in the official judgment, made Coulson one of the few senior news executives convicted in the phone-hacking prosecutions. He was released on 21 November 2014 after serving less than five months (BBC News (UK public broadcaster)).

The sequence matters: the same skills that made Coulson a successful tabloid editor — aggressive newsgathering, loyalty, influence — are the ones the courts found criminal. His career since 2014 has been an attempt to manage that contradiction.

What’s Andy Coulson doing now?

Since leaving prison, Coulson has built a second career around the very quality that destroyed his first: his understanding of how reputation works under fire. The vehicle is a consultancy and a podcast.

What is Coulson Partners?

Coulson founded the firm after leaving prison, and it describes its work as advising on reputation, crisis, communications and leadership challenges (Coulson Partners (his own firm)). Its official biography of Coulson presents him as a former Downing Street director of communications and former News of the World editor — experience reframed as expertise rather than baggage.

Does Andy Coulson still work in communications?

• Advisory work: Coulson Partners — strategic communication and reputation management for executives and boards
• Podcast: Crisis What Crisis?, focused on resilience, leadership and navigating personal or professional crisis (Crisis What Crisis? (official podcast site))
• Speaking: public events on crisis management and leadership

Coulson also hosts the podcast Crisis What Crisis?, whose official site says it focuses on resilience, leadership and navigating personal or professional crisis and has featured more than 100 conversations with crisis survivors and experts (Crisis What Crisis? (official podcast site)). Coulson Partners says the podcast has been made available to thousands of inmates through a prison partnership — a detail that turns his own imprisonment into the source of his authority (Coulson Partners (his own firm)).

Is Andy Coulson a public speaker?

Coulson has turned his own record into the keynote: he speaks on crisis and reputation management, with his conviction presented as field experience no other consultant can claim. The playbook is not unique. Anthony Scaramucci, who lasted ten days as White House communications director, turned a scandalous short tenure into a media career (Anthony Scaramucci: 10-day tenure). Megyn Kelly, who moved from cable news to an independent media presence, followed a similar path (Megyn Kelly: career, politics, net worth).

The implication: Coulson’s entire second career rests on a volatile balance — the past that qualifies him is also the past that can unmake him.

What happened to Andy Coulson and Rebekah Brooks?

Rebekah Brooks, a fellow News International executive, was the other central figure in the phone-hacking prosecution. Coulson and Brooks sat in the same dock; they came out on different sides of history.

Was Rebekah Brooks prosecuted?

• Yes — Brooks was charged alongside Coulson in the phone-hacking investigation (Crown Prosecution Service (England’s prosecution authority))
• She was acquitted of all charges related to phone hacking (Courts and Tribunals Judiciary (official court records))
• Her career resumed inside News UK, where she later returned as chief executive

What was the outcome for Rebekah Brooks?

Brooks walked free: she was acquitted of all charges in the same trial that convicted Coulson (Courts and Tribunals Judiciary (official court records)). She later returned to News UK as chief executive. The contrast with Coulson could not be sharper — two executives, same dock, opposite verdicts, and opposite professional afterlives.

Is Andy Coulson still married?

Coulson’s personal life is far less documented than his professional one. What is known comes from biographical profiles rather than from Coulson himself.

Who is Andy Coulson’s wife?

• Coulson is married to Emma-Louise Coulson (Encyclopaedia Britannica (reference encyclopedia))
• The couple married before his conviction and remain together

Does Andy Coulson have children?

Yes — two children (Encyclopaedia Britannica (reference encyclopedia)). The children’s names are not part of the public biography.

What this means: a marriage that survived scandal and prison gives Coulson’s credibility a foundation no consultancy can fake — but it also keeps him in the public eye as a family man, a more sympathetic figure than the tabloid editor of 2007.

Andy Coulson’s timeline

Thirteen dates, one direction: every rise in Coulson’s career repeated the pattern — close to power, then forced out, then rebuilt elsewhere.

• 21 January 1968 — born Andrew Edward Coulson in Stone, Staffordshire
• 2003 – January 2007 — editor of the News of the World; resigned January 2007 after royal editor Clive Goodman’s conviction (The Guardian (UK national newspaper))
• 2007 — became communications director of the Conservative Party
• May 2010 – January 2011 — Downing Street director of communications under David Cameron; resigned as scandal intensified
• 8 July 2011 — arrested on suspicion of phone-hacking and corruption offences (BBC News (UK public broadcaster))
• July 2012 — charged with conspiracy to intercept communications without lawful authority (Crown Prosecution Service (England’s prosecution authority))
• October 2013 — trial began at the Old Bailey
• 4 July 2014 — sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment
• 21 November 2014 — released after serving less than five months (BBC News (UK public broadcaster))
• 3 June 2015 — acquitted of a Scottish perjury charge (BBC News (UK public broadcaster))
• 2016 / 2017 — founded Coulson Partners; official bio says 2017, LinkedIn says January 2016 (LinkedIn (professional profile))
• Since 2020 — hosts the podcast Crisis What Crisis?

The catch: each phase of Coulson’s professional life — journalism, politics, prison, consultancy — carries its own narrative, but the thread that ties them together is always the phone-hacking conviction.

What’s confirmed and what’s still unclear

The public record is solid on the core events; the gaps are mostly about money, clients and intentions.

The gap between what’s known and what isn’t is exactly the gap Coulson’s business operates in: enough documented reputation to be credible, enough opacity to keep the client list private.

The story in three quotes

Three documents carry the arc of Coulson’s story in their own words.

“Conspiracy to intercept communications without lawful authority” — the charge at the centre of his criminal case.

Crown Prosecution Service (England’s prosecution authority)

“Focuses on resilience, leadership and navigating personal or professional crisis.”

Crisis What Crisis? — official podcast description

Sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment for conspiring to intercept communications without lawful authority.

Courts and Tribunals Judiciary — R v Coulson and others (sentencing record)

The pattern in these records: one charge, one description of the work, one sentence — together they define the man far more concisely than any single biography.

The takeaway

Coulson’s story is not a redemption arc with a clean box — it’s a career rebuilt on the ruins of a scandal, with a consultancy and a podcast that turn his conviction into credentials. For any executive hiring Coulson Partners, the trade-off is blunt: you gain someone who has actually lived through a reputation crisis, and you inherit a criminal record that any future news cycle can put back on the front page. For Coulson himself, the implication is equally clear: keep building the reputation business, or get defined once more by the past.

Frequently asked questions