James Murdoch recalled to testify in phone hacking scandal
James Murdoch is being called back before a committee of the British Parliament to further explain his involvement in the cellphone hacking scandal that continues to shake the family-controlled News Corp. media empire.
Parliament’s Culture, Media and Sport Committee said Tuesday that it would like to re-question the 38-year-old scion to sort out conflicting evidence provided to the panel in its investigation of the ethics scandal at News Corp.’s now-shuttered News of the World tabloid. Its reporters allegedly listened to messages left on cellphones of soccer stars, celebrities, crime victims, fallen soldiers and members of the royal family.
The affair has damaged the reputations of James Murdoch and his father, News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch, and raised questions over whether the younger Murdoch should eventually run the sprawling media conglomerate. Earlier this year, James Murdoch was elevated to deputy chief operating officer of News Corp., the No. 3 position in the company.
The development in London was one of several Tuesday that underscored how the phone hacking crisis is far from over for News Corp. and its 80-year-old chieftain.
In Australia, where Rupert Murdoch controls more than two-thirds of the country’s metropolitan and regional newspapers, the government said it would hold an inquiry into issues of media ownership.
In the U.S., a group of shareholders amended a lawsuit — first filed in the Delaware courts in March — to include allegations that “for years, highly improper (and at times illegal) conduct has been carried out throughout News Corp. subsidiaries around the world without any board oversight or restraint.”
The shareholders, led by New York’s Amalgamated Bank and the New Orleans Employees’ Retirement System, said two News Corp. subsidiaries — News America Marketing and the NDS Group — were once accused of “stealing computer technology, hacking into business plans and computers and violating the law through a wide range of anti-competitive behavior.”
News America Marketing, which distributes coupon inserts for newspapers, settled suits brought by competitors for $650 million.
News Corp. declined to comment on the legal matters.
James Murdoch, meanwhile, must convince members of Parliament that he was unaware of the magnitude of the illegal activity at the tabloid for several years. He is expected to appear before the group next month.
Since 2007, James Murdoch — the younger of Murdoch’s two sons — has managed News Corp.’s Asian and European operations, including its portfolio of British newspapers.
In July, when he and his mogul father appeared before the prominent panel, James Murdoch said he learned only late last year that the illegal activity was not contained to a single “rogue reporter” and a corrupt investigator — as News Corp. had long maintained.
But two of his former underlings have since challenged James Murdoch’s statements to Parliament. Last week, they told the panel they had shared a crucial piece of evidence with him in 2008.
Both men — Colin Myler, the former tabloid editor, and the publication’s lawyer, Tom Crone — detailed a 15-minute meeting they had with their boss in 2008. They said they showed James Murdoch an email with obvious implications that hacking practices extended to several reporters at News of the World.
The two men said they had met with Murdoch to discuss whether to settle a lawsuit brought by one of the phone hacking victims.
In a statement provided by the company’s Britain-based News International, James Murdoch said he stood by the account that he gave during his appearance before the panel in July. “James Murdoch is happy to appear in front of the committee again to answer any further questions members might have,” a News Corp. spokeswoman said.
