Singer Charlotte Church: Press destroyed my career

(AP)She was just 13 when Rupert Murdoch asked her to sing at his wedding.

Charlotte Church was given a choice: a 100,000 pound (S$201,600) fee, or a chance to generate good will with the media magnate by performing for free. She wanted the cash, but her record company and manager said no, it was better to make friends with Murdoch, head of a global news and entertainment empire.

'Despite my teenage business head screaming 'Think how many tamagotchies you could buy!' I was pressured into taking the latter option,' she told Britain's press ethics committee. 'This strategy failed ... for me.' Church, 25, told Britain's media ethics inquiry on Monday that the Murdoch press, and other British tabloids, had ruthlessly tormented her since she was a child singing sensation, blowing her credibility 'to bits' and badly damaging her career.

She said press intrusion had a devastating impact on her family life and particularly on her mother. Church said her mother had tried to kill herself in part because she knew a newspaper was planning to expose her husband's extramarital affair.