James Moore: Rupert Murdoch's off the hook as Wall Street moves on
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Your support makes all the difference.Outlook It looks very much as if Rupert Murdoch has dodged another bullet. After exhaustively combing through a vast trove of emails and other material provided by News Corporation, the FBI hasn’t found enough for the Department of Justice to be satisfied it can bring a case.
News Corp journalists would either have had to engage in phone hacking on US soil or over a US network to merit a prosecution.
The DoJ has also decided not to test rules banning US companies from bribing public officials abroad. Alleged payments to police and other public officials in return for juicy tidbits might have fallen foul of these regulations, but the DoJ appears willing to leave prosecuting this one to the Brits.
Unless, of course, new evidence comes to light – but there appears to be scant chance of that happening.
Wall Street’s got what it wanted: the split of Mr Murdoch’s publishing and broadcast arms, and many of those proven to have been hacked have been paid. Andy Coulson went to jail for a bit, and no one has much sympathy for the small fry who joined him.
Now everyone seems to want it to go away, and with a US Presidential campaign looming, they’ll probably get their wish, at least when it comes to the Americans’ interest in the matter.
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