The Criminality Of Rupert Murdoch

When the history of the last decade of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st century is written, one of the most pernicious figures depicted will be Rupert Murdoch. His brand of toxic, illiberal, fact-challenged populism espoused through his tabloid papers and networks will be judged as a significant part of the decline of two of the great Western democracies, the US and the UK. But beyond his destructive and outsized political power, largely allowed by governmental policy, Murdoch should also be remembered as a criminal on a global scale.

Murdoch’s first real brush with the law cam when it was revealed that his UK tabloid the News of the World was routinely illegally hacking the phones of celebrities, royals and private citizens. In its most egregious act, News investigators hacked into and deleted voicemail messages from the phone of murdered schoolgirl Milly Downer, interfering with the investigation and giving the grieving parents false hope that their child might still be alive. That false hope allowed the News of the World to actually get an exclusive interview with the Downer parents who expressed their hope that their daughter might still be alive because it appeared that phone messages were being picked up. It’s hard to get any lower than that.

It later turned out that News of the World had also paid over £100,000 in bribes to five police officers for information about various cases as well as paying hush money to phone hacking victims. The company was also accused of deliberately misleading and hindering the original investigation into the illegal phone hacking and the full extent of the criminality was not revealed until 2011, nearly six years after the original scandal.

In the US, Murdoch’s Fox News not only became the propaganda arm of the Republican party but was also a vipers nest of continual sexual harassment and assault. Its president, Roger Ailes, was finally forced to resign after multiple reports of sexual harassment and assault. Its number one star, Bill O’Reilly, has also been forced to resign after further revelations of his own sexual harassment and assaults. A number of other senior executives associated with these scandals have also resigned. Fox apparently used corporate funds to silence a number of these accusers and renewed O’Reilly’s contract with the knowledge that he had once again been accused of sexual harassment and forced to reach a $32 million settlement.

Then, yesterday, as part of the ongoing FIFA corruption trial, it was revealed that Fox Sports paid millions in bribes in order to secure broadcast rights for major soccer tournaments. The scheme, as it usually does with corporations these days, involves offshore shell companies and sham contracts in order to funnel nearly $4 million in money for bribes. The head of the Argentinian company that eventually paid the bribes to FIFA for the television rights was asked by prosecutors whom he kept informed about the bribery efforts. His response, “Fox Pan American Sports. Fox Sports.”

So, within a decade, the Murdoch empire has managed to become involved in three pretty serious criminal scandals across three continents. Isn’t that pretty much the definition of a world-wide criminal enterprise. And Rupert Murdoch is its boss.