(CCPJ/IFEX) – The CCPJ has learned that two more journalists have been the target of a police wiretap investigation, one week after it was revealed that the telephone conversations of a third journalist had been monitored. **For background to phone tapping of the third Canadian journalist, see IFEX alert dated 11 June 1998** On 15 […]
(CCPJ/IFEX) – The CCPJ has learned that two more journalists have been the
target of a police wiretap investigation, one week after it was revealed
that the telephone conversations of a third journalist had been monitored.
**For background to phone tapping of the third Canadian journalist, see IFEX
alert dated 11 June 1998**
On 15 June 1998, the internal affairs division of the Edmonton Police
Service delivered letters to Charlie Gillis, a crime reporter for the daily
“Edmonton Journal”, and Donna Marie Artuso, a columnist for the daily
“Edmonton Sun”, informing them that their private phone calls had been
monitored by police. The letters indicated that the journalists’
conversations had been monitored from 27 January to 28 March 1998.
Police confirmed that the wiretap is part of a criminal investigation into
an alleged breach of trust by a police officer who leaked a confidential
report to several media outlets in July 1997.
The third journalist, Janice Johnston, a reporter with CFRN News in
Edmonton, had aired a story in 1997 dealing with the investigation. Shortly
after the report was broadcast, Johnston’s newsroom was raided by police,
armed with a search warrant (see IFEX alert). The police demanded that
Johnston turn over the confidential police report, which she did. The
“Edmonton Journal” and the “Edmonton Sun” also carried stories about the
report.
Commenting on the incident, Gillis stated that, as a crime reporter, he
accepts the risk that he might call someone whose phone is tapped. However,
he questioned the use of a wiretap for “an internal problem.”
For her part, Artuso believes that the phone tapping will make her job more
difficult. “This is a step backwards for freedom of the press in this
country.I don’t know how I can do my job if my sources aren’t confident
they can call me any more.”
Kelly Gordon, a spokesperson for the police, defended the wiretap. “This is
being taken as some personal attack on the media,” Gordon said. “Frankly,
grow up and get over yourselves. This is a criminal investigation. It’s not
about the media.”
The interception of a private citizen’s communications can be legally
authorised by a judge in Canada, but only where the requesting government
agency has shown reasonable grounds for the surveillance. Under the Canadian
law that permits this type of surveillance, individuals who have had their
communications intercepted must be officially informed of it.
Although the phone tapping was legal, “Edmonton Sun” editor-in-chief Paul
Stanway called the action “profoundly disturbing.”
“It’s always been our policy to co-operate with police and we believe
wiretaps should be part of the police arsenal,” he said. “But these powers
should be used with discretion – and in this case bugging reporters’ phones
to discover who leaked a document seems very over the top.”
“A great many people talk to reporters in confidence,” Stanway said.
“Reporters have risked jail to keep such conversations confidential. The
possibility they are being monitored can only have a chilling effect and
could discourage the already limited flow of information to our readers.”
