Philadelphia Newspapers LLC, the owner of the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Daily News, has has filed a request to hire a law firm for "(i)nvestigation of certain incident(s) involving the unauthorized recording of confidential pre-petition meeting(s) between the Debtors and their senior secured lenders," Philly.com reported Tuesday.

Recording of such conversations without the parties' consent is illegal in Philadelphia.

Citizen's Bank, the newspaper's top creditor, and the newspaper's CEO Brian Tierney declined to comment. The newspapers are in about US$395 million debt, which investors and Tierney borrowed to buy the Daily News, the Inquirer and Philly.com, their shared Web site, the site reported.

The group is asking permission to hire the firm Elliott Greenleaf and Siedzikowski, P.C. The hearing has been set for March 16.