NEW YORK (AP) — News Corp, Rupert Murdoch’s media empire, has confirmed that Rebekah Brooks is back at the top spot in London more than a year after she was acquitted of charges in a hacking scandal that shocked the U.K.
The New York company said Wednesday that Brooks, 47, will be CEO of News UK, returning to a role she left in 2011 amid the hacking scandal at the company’s now defunct News of the World paper.
The company has spent more than $500 million in legal settlements with hacking victims and other related costs.
Brooks was long considered a Rupert protege and began her career at News of the World in 1989. She starts Monday.
News UK today includes the Sun, the Times and the Sunday Times papers.
Brooks was acquitted of British charges related to the phone hacking, bribing officials and obstructing police in June 2014. (Her husband was also cleared.) She has said that she didn’t know of phone hacking while she was News of the World editor between 2000 and 2003.
The scandal caused the shutdown of News of the World along with arrests of dozens of journalists, police and other officials. It may not be over. British prosecutors said in late August that they were considering charges against News Corp over the phone hacking.
The company on Wednesday also said that David Dinsmore, the editor of the Sun, would become News UK’s COO and named Tony Gallagher as the tabloid’s new editor. He has worked for the Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph papers.
Brooks will also work on digital efforts at News Corp, which separated from the entertainment conglomerate Twenty-First Century Fox two years ago.
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