Founder of US cable TV firm arrested

The founder of US cable TV firm Adelphia Communications has been arrested.

John Rigas, 77, and two of his sons are accused of looting the now-bankrupt company and using it as their "personal piggy bank".

He was arrested along with his sons, Timothy, a former company chief financial officer, and Michael, another former company executive.

Also arrested were James R Brown, the former vice president of finance, and Michael C Mulcahey, the former director of internal reporting, at their homes in Couldersport, Pennsylvania, where the company is based.

In addition to the criminal charges, the Securities and Exchange Commission has brought a civil lawsuit in the US District Court in Manhattan, calling the case "one of the most extensive financial frauds ever to take place at a public company".

The SEC said the company fraudulently excluded billions of dollars in liabilities from its financial statements, falsified statistics, inflated its earnings to meet Wall Street's expectations and concealed "rampant self-dealing by the Rigas family."