168-year old British newspaper closes amid scandal

Added by Erik West on July 9, 2011

News of the World, a 168 year-old British newspaper and a subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, issued its final articles as the newspaper’s staff assembled for the paper’s last working shift on Saturday. The owner of the paper, News Corporation, is shutting down the paper in response to on-going investigations about the paper’s practices used in its investigative journalism.

 

“The News of the World is in the business of holding others to account. But it failed with it came to itself.”, wrote the paper’s editor on the newspaper’s web site.

The newspaper is closing, in part, after the arrest of former editor Andy Coulson and former journalist Clive Goodman for charges that include suspicion of corruption, conspiring to intercept communications, and hacking in to the phones of celebrities, murder victims, and grieving families of dead soldiers. The charges stem from police investigations dating from 2007.

Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron appointed two public inquiries on Saturday – one to investigate failures of the police to effectively investigate the alleged phone-hacking that took place over several years, and the other public inquiry is expected to examine British journalism ethics.

A lot of criticism focuses on a former editor of the newspaper, News International’s chief executive Rebekah Brooks. Ms. Brooks claims she knew nothing of the phone hacking, some of which occurred during her tenure. She also claims that the founder and chief of News Corporation had rejected her offer to resign, while Mr. Murdoch said that Ms. Brooks has his complete support.

The paper’s closing puts a total of 280 reporters, editors and other support staff out of work, yet it is expected some will be rehired for another publication, a new Sunday edition of The Sun newspaper, planned by News International.