NotW News

Whaddaya know? Everybody and their dog are talking about Mr. Murdoch's fall from grace.

I hear UK PM Mr. Cameron might be turning his back on Mr. Murdoch; opposition leader Mr. Miliband is calling for prosecutions and such.

And now, The Guardian, in an opinion piece on the subject, contains the following (emphasis added):

"Meanwhile, US law may enter the fray. A former Labour cabinet minister has alerted attention to the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which makes an American company (News Corp) liable for colossal fines if any employee bribes a foreign official (the Met police) even if no one at head office knew. What's more, any whistleblower inside the company (sacked News of the World reporters), stands to win a percentage of that fine if they report acts of bribery."

Kind of ironic, really: isn't self-interest what makes capitalism tick?

Update:

Tuesday, 12/07/2011. The SMH reproduces a Telegraph, London piece, signed by Christopher Hope: "Heir Apparent Could be Charged in US and Britain".

Among other things, this piece states:

"The US Foreign Corrupt Practices (FCP) Act makes it a crime for US companies to offer corrupt payments to foreign officials. If the allegations of payments to police officers totalling more than £100,000 ($149,000) are proven, Mr Murdoch might face a US prosecution and the News Corp empire might face a bill of more than $90 million.
(...)
"In Britain, Mr [James] Murdoch's admission that he made out of court settlements to victims of phone hacking could leave him vulnerable to prosecution under anti-snooping legislation.
"Alan Johnson, a Labour MP who served as home secretary under Gordon Brown, suggested that Mr Murdoch could be charged under the Regulation of Investigative Powers Act, which covers the 'criminal liability of directors'."