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Murdoch to try and stem mounting corruption scandal
News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch (AP)
Media mogul Rupert Murdoch is returning to London this week in a desperate attempt to contain a crisis that won't go away. In fact, it just got even worse.
Now he's facing a showdown in the newsroom of the crown jewel of his British empire - The Sun newspaper - after a series of arrests of staff members.
They were the result of an internal bribery investigation, triggering predawn raids in what staffers call a heavy handed "witchhunt."
"Why do you need 20 police officers to raid the home of a single journalist?" asks Trevor Kavanaugh, the newspaper's associate editor.
Murdoch may be coming to London to avoid a mutiny and reassure employees, but the last time one of his newspapers was in this much trouble - the News of the World - he shut it down.
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Many may wonder what Murdoch can actually accomplish with his visit.
Last July, he said his priority was saving the skin of Rebekah Brooks, then-chief of News International. Within days, she was gone, forced to resign.
The corruption probe is running alongside the ongoing hacking investigation, which has already seen Murdoch eat humble pie.
Murdoch's heir apparent, son James, has come under fire too.
The family is not just fighting for the survival of the Murdoch Empire, but the legacy of the man who built it.
Even as Murdoch tries to contain the damage in the U.K., his problems in the U.S. are mounting. The FBI has stepped-up investigations for any signs of illegal practices that may have crossed the Atlantic to his publications in the States.
It is that threat of the cancer spreading outside of Britain and eating away at an empire that includes Fox News and 20th Century Fox film studios - which last year had revenues of $34 billion -- that really worries Murdoch's lieutenants.
"We're more frightened by the [US justice department] than we are of Scotland Yard," a source close to News Corp told Reuters last year. "All Scotland Yard can go after is News International, but the justice department can go after all of News Corporation."
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