This article is more than 7 years old

This article is more than 7 years old

An extraordinary story has broken in Scotland that has galvanised the country's media elite. Though it is the subject of much chatter among journalists, none of the mainstream outlets has reported it.

For months, a Twitter account known as Charlotte Fakeovers (@charlotteFakes) has been running a series of snippets from private emails between people involved in Rangers football club during the crisis that eventually led to its insolvency.

According to a well-placed Glaswegian media insider, the tweeter should be regarded as "the Julian Assange of Scotland". He said: "These revelations are explosive but I understand, in this post-Leveson atmosphere, why the papers are not publishing them.

"Though there is no proof either way, there is a feeling that the communications might have been obtained illegally."

In fact, according to a source familiar with the situation, there is no way the emails could have been obtained legally and the publication of them is a possible breach of the data protection act.

Scottish police are now investigating the Twitter account, a fact reported yesterday by one online news outlet that has dared to highlight the CharlotteFakeovers story, The Drum.

A police spokesman told The Drum's writer: "We can confirm that we did receive a complaint in connection with a Twitter account and police enquiries are ongoing to establish if there is any criminality involved."

Among people named in the correspondence are the club's former owner Craig Whyte, the man who masterminded its recreation, Charles Green, the club's PR, then and now, Jack Irvine, and even the political editor of the Sunday Times, Isabel Oakeshott.

The revelations have been acutely embarrassing for Irvine, who declined to comment. But a former colleague told me he believes the emails need to be seen in the context of Rangers problems and the consequent frenetic atmosphere at the time.

Irvine, who edited the Scottish Sun for three years from 1987, launched a PR company, Media House, some 20 years ago.

A legal firm acting for Irvine, Levy & McRae, did successfully request the removal of some documents from the website being used to host them, Scribd.

The Drum story quotes Channel 4 News's chief correspondent, Alex Thomson, as saying that the reluctance of mainstream media to report the story is related to the Leveson report.

Thomson was one of the very few reporters outside Scotland to cover the Rangers crisis in any depth. Indeed, mainstream newspapers in Scotland were slow to cover it too.

Instead, all the central revelations to emerge came from Phil Mac Giolla Bhain, who runs a blog and published a book, Downfall: how Rangers FC self-destructed.