Justice department writes to News Corp to determine whether it violated US laws on foreign corrupt practices, say reports

This article is more than 9 years old

This article is more than 9 years old

US prosecutors have written to Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation requesting information on alleged payments made to the British police for tips for stories, according to reports.

A confidential letter has been sent from the US justice department in an effort to determine whether News Corp violated American laws on foreign corrupt practices.

The US justice department said it had no comment on the report, carried by Bloomberg, which cited "a person with knowledge of the matter" as its source.

Shares in News Corp fell 1.7% on the news. The company did not return calls for comment.

It is believed the letter relates to allegations of payments made to police by News of the World staff in the UK. If staff were found guilty, they may also fall foul of American law, because the parent group is based in New York.

Under US law, it is a crime for a business or their employees to pay off representatives of a foreign government to gain commercial advantage.

"The inquiry seems to be following the typical pattern for one of these investigations," said professor Mike Koehler of Butler University and author of FCPA Professor blog. He said the US authorities would be interested in a "very broad spectrum" of News Corp employees.

"It's very typical for payments in these cases to have been made by employees of US firms who are not in the US and who are not US citizens," Koehler said.

News Corp, whose US newspapers include the tabloid New York Post and the Wall Street Journal, is already under investigation following allegations that victims of September 11 had their phones hacked.

This claims appeared in the Daily Mirror, a rival title to News International's Sun newspaper, and have yet to be substantiated elsewhere.

Nonetheless, the allegations are being taken seriously. In July, News Corp retained Mark Mendelsohn of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind & Garrison – an attorney who had previously overseen the foreign corrupt practices investigations unit in the US justice department – to help it deal with the phone-hacking scandal.

News Corp is conducting its own internal probe and has pledged to assist the US authorities in their inquiries.