The ordeal of Rupert Murdoch’s phone-hacking scandal, rooted in illegal activities that took place in the United Kingdom, has now spread to the United States, where members of a prominent publishing family are expressing regrets over their dealings with the media mogul.

 

Several members of the Bancroft family, which sold The Wall Street Journal to Murdoch’s News Corp. in 2009, now say had they been aware of what was going on overseas at the time of negotiations, they would have backed out of the sale.

 

“If I had known what I know now, I would have pushed harder against” the Murdoch bid, Christopher Bancroft told ProPublica. Bancroft’s remarks were echoed by family members Lisa Steele and Elisabeth Goth. The Bancrofts sold the newspaper and its parent, Dow Jones & Company, Inc., to Murdoch’s News Corp. for $5 billion.

 

Bancroft added that Les Hinton, Murdoch’s publisher of the WSJ, should be moved aside in the wake of revelations that he may have lied to a parliamentary committee investigating the hacking scandal.

 

On their way out the door in 2007, the Bancroft family insisted on including in the sale a clause that requires Dow Jones to preserve the integrity of the company and all its publications. The pact established a special committee empowered to hire investigators, lawyers and accountants, with access to News Corp. books, records and people.

 

It is not clear what actions the committee can actually take.

 

The controversy may soon become the focus of U.S. officials as well. Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-West Virginia), chairman of the Commerce, Science and Transportation committee, is calling for a congressional inquiry into Murdoch’s media operation, saying he thinks “we’ll find some criminal stuff.”

 

The FBI has opened an investigation into allegations that Murdoch’s people in England tried to access cellphone messages and records of those who died in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in violation of U.S. laws.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Bancroft Family Members Express Regrets at Selling Wall Street Journal to Murdoch (by Richard Tofel, ProPublica)

Phone Hacking: Rupert Murdoch Faces Inquiry into US Companies (by Alex Spillius, Nick Allen and Richard Blackden, The Telegraph)

Hapless Former WSJ Owners Could Yet Sting Murdoch (by Rob Cox and Reynolds Holding, Reuters)

FBI Opens Inquiry into Murdoch's News Corp. (by Richard A. Serrano, Jim Puzzanghera and Kim Geiger, Los Angeles Times)