James Murdoch Stands by Phone-Hacking Denials in New Testimony

Tuesday, 24 April 2012 08:31

Written by Administrator

By Richard Allen Greene

James Murdoch insisted Tuesday that he knew little about the scale of phone hacking by people working for the News of the World, as he continued his fight to limit the damage the scandal does to him and his family's media empire.

He was testifying before an independent British inquiry into journalistic ethics prompted by phone hacking at the defunct News of the World, once the flagship British Sunday tabloid of News Corp.

The scandal has reverberated through the British political establishment, led to dozens of arrests on suspicion of criminal activity, and forced News Corp. to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds in compensation to the victims of phone hacking.

James Murdoch and his father, Rupert Murdoch, have been hammered over the past year about what they knew about phone hacking by people working for them.

Rupert Murdoch is scheduled to appear Wednesday and perhaps Thursday morning at the Leveson Inquiry, where his son is giving evidence Tuesday.

The younger Murdoch has already been called twice to testify before British lawmakers and resigned from a number of top management positions at British subsidiaries of his father's media empire.

He and his father have always denied knowing about the scale of phone hacking, which police say could have affected thousands of people, ranging from celebrities and politicians to crime victims and war veterans.

James Murdoch said Tuesday he had no reason to look into illegal eavesdropping by his employees when he took over the company's British newspaper subsidiary in December 2007.

A News of the World reporter and a private investigator had been sent to prison earlier that year for hacking the phones of the staff of Princes William and Harry, but Murdoch said he had been assured the problem went no further.

"I was not told sufficient information to go and turn over a whole bunch of stones that I was told had already been turned over," he said. "I don't think that, short of knowing they weren't giving me the full picture, I would've been able to know that at the time."

The journalist who went to prison, Clive Goodman, had been saying that phone-hacking went beyond his case, Leveson Inquiry counsel Robert Jay said.

"I was not aware of that," Murdoch replied.

He told the Leveson Inquiry on Tuesday that he did not decide what went into the company's British tabloids, The Sun and the News of the World, relying on his editors to make the decisions.

He was also pressed on his relationship with British politicians, including former Prime Minister Tony Blair and the current leader, David Cameron.

He acknowledged meeting with them, but denied having lobbied them improperly about his family's business interests.

And he denied having made a "crass calculation" about how The Sun's endorsement of Cameron's Conservative party before the 2010 elections would affect News Corp.

Dozens of people have been arrested in criminal investigations into phone and e-mail hacking and police bribery, and police asked prosecutors last week to charge at least eight people.

The suspects include at least one journalist and a police officer, the Crown Prosecution Service said, declining to name them.

No charges have been filed yet, and the Crown Prosecution Service said it did not know when a decision would be made about charges.

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