The conviction of Rolf Harris on 12 counts of indecent assault dominates today's national newspapers. It gets front page treatment in each of the 10 titles and I counted a total of 43 pages devoted to the case, plus several leading articles.

The Daily Mail carries the most (nine pages) while the Daily Star and Metro, with two pages each, publish the least.

Given Harris's fame, the scale of the coverage is unsurprising. Here was a man, to use the Mail's front page headline phrase, who was "for 50 years... the face of wholesome family TV" who was, in truth, "a predator who duped us all."

According to the Guardian's splash, he was portrayed in his trial "as a 'Jekyll and Hyde' character who used his celebrity status to grope and abuse young women and girls."

There was, by contrast, precious little space given over to the phone hacking trial, which (aside from the Guardian), got short shrift. It meant that readers of most papers were not informed about the astonishing mitigating statement on Neville Thurlbeck's behalf by his lawyer and the plea for leniency by Glenn Mulcaire's lawyer.

But phone hacking did get a sort of walk-on role in two interesting leading articles about the Harris verdicts in the Mail and the Sun.

The two papers blamed the Leveson inquiry, which was set up as a result of the hacking revelations in July 2011, for the police's initial refusal to confirm that Harris had been the subject of police interest.

Harris was placed on police bail in November 2012 after being interviewed under caution as part of Operation Yewtree, the investigation set up in the wake of the Jimmy Savile sex abuse allegations.

Reporters soon knew about it but were unable to report it. Again, when Harris was formally arrested on 28 March 2013, police did not identify him.

It was an open secret in newsrooms and some journalists in the know asked the police to confirm it. They would not do so, saying only that an 82-year-old man had been arrested under Yewtree.

Harris's name did appear on social media and certain websites (such as Guido Fawkes) but the mainstream press did not report it until the Sun broke the story on 19 April 2013.

Today's Sun editorial, "Secrecy peril", returns to that incident by berating "the hysterics of Hacked Off and the newspaper-loathing luvvies who lazily line up with them" for the police's decision to refuse to confirm they had arrested Harris. The Sun says:

"To their shame the Metropolitan police, revelling in the new culture of secrecy launched by Lord Justice Leveson's abject inquiry, refused to identify him... even after his name was put to them for confirmation... It may be too much to hope that the celebrities backing Hacked Off's tribal war on the tabloids would ever pause to think what they're doing. But let them not pretend, as they do, that Leveson's recommendations have anything but grave consequences for our press and our democracy."

The Sun also refers to Harris's lawyers having fought to prevent his name emerging, and the Mail's editorial, "Secrecy betrays justice", underlines that too:

"Harris's lawyers... fired off aggressive legal letters to newspapers – citing the Leveson inquiry – which argued there was no public interest in reporting he was under investigation for historic sex attacks. Meanwhile, the police – themselves cowed by Leveson – initially refused to confirm the TV presenter's identity."

The Mail argues that "disturbingly, post-Leveson, there are many examples of police holding, arresting and even charging suspects in secret", adding:

"This chilling practice is not only an affront to open justice and the hallmark of totalitarian regimes. It also hands a gift to predators like Harris who depend upon their frightened victims believing they are on their own."

Although four other papers (Times, Independent, Mirror and Star) publish leading articles on the Harris verdicts, they do not refer to Leveson and the police silence over Harris's identity.

The Times gives faint praise to the Crown Prosecution Service for securing Harris's conviction. It refers to the corrosive nature of celebrity culture that allowed men to use their fame as a cover to abuse the trust it bought.

The Independent questions that historical "culture", arguing that it "can create the impression that at a certain time or in a certain place a type of behaviour was acceptable or, at the least, was not worthy of negative comment. That can never be true."

The Mirror believes "Harris deserves a long spell in prison for betraying the trust of his victims and the nation", while the Star says:

"Harris, like Jimmy Savile, thought he was untouchable because he was a national treasure."

And another "untouchable" could soon be unveiled as a predatory abuser: the late Liberal MP Cyril Smith. It has emerged that he wrote to the BBC's director-general asking the corporation not to investigate the "private lives of certain MPs".

The politician, who died in 2010, also wrote to the home secretary to complain about reporters being responsible for "filth, innuendo and stirring".