Posts by Dylan Reeve
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to nzlemming,
I’m neither left wing nor right, but I confess I don’t see Slater as a journalist, regardless of what the judge said. If 5 policemen spent 10 hours in his home, taking everything they could find, yes I would call it excessive unless their warrant cited as grounds that there was a reasonable suspicion that he had hacked the information himself. Because we now know he’s got form in that area. Nothing about Hager’s previous activity as a journalist indicates that he has broken the law or been a party to the breaking of the law. Quite the contrary.
And no one is suggesting that Hager has broken the law or was party to it. I don't know what was specified on the warrant, or what is normal for a search of that nature. But I do know that a judge reviewed the police's application and issued a warrant so I'm assuming the basic premise of the search and seizure is legitimate. Hager's lawyers will not have an opportunity to challenge that in court, which I believe is the appropriate place.
If you’ are going to offer up hypotheticals, at least make them equivalent.
I think it was pretty equivalent. Regardless of Slater's past form (which I agree is terrible) I'm sure he is capable of actual journalism.
If thing played out as I suggested then I think it's very equal, and the same principles should apply.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to Kumara Republic,
In any case, there are times when the law has to be bent for the greater good. Especially when those entrusted to maintain the law think it’s not illegal when the President’s doing it.
In general I'd rather have that law bending take place in a court, not at the whim of police.
If the police are found to be wrong in this instance in a court then it can inform future behavior in a predictable and accountable way.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to Joe Wylie,
Your constant harping on ‘we’ ignores that you could well be addressing people who, for all you know, may well be better informed about a number of aspects of this case and its background than you are. Yet you continue to offer yourself as some kind of paragon of virtuous ignorance.
Aside from the police I'm not really aware of anyone who is better informed about it - I've certainly not seen anyone claim to be. However I'm entirely willing to have my ignorance dispelled, at which point I'm happy to reconsider my position.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to Trevor Nicholls,
The thing about “normal” is that a reasonably large number of people are familiar with it. As things stand, this appears pretty extreme, if not a first of its kind. Perhaps it really is “the new normal”, in which case we should be starting to think about a revolution, not downplaying it.
I've not really seen anything like that, but if you'd like to point be at some information I'm keen to look at it. Everything I've seen is really just speculation.
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Here's a hypothetical...
It's 2020, Labour are nearing the end of the first term in power. Whale Oil, who is somehow still active, publishes an extensive series of articles based on hacked emails and chat transcripts between Labour MPs and various Union leaders and some left wing bloggers/commentators that raise serious questions about the conduct of those MPs and the people they were communicating with.
A few months later after Labour still manages to triumph the police obtain a search warrant to seize computers and associated evidence from Slater in order to further their investigation into the criminal hacking that lead to the release of information upon which Slater based his articles.
So the victim(s) are left wing, the journalist is Slater, everything else is basically the same - are we still holding the same position? Slater isn't being charged, but his communication with the hacker are being investigated as he's a material witness.
I'm fairly certain that some of the voices critical of the police actions would Hager would have no such issue in this scenario.
Maybe this is pointless - but my position is one where I'm trying to look at the most basic facts while ignoring the political context.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to Russell Brown,
If I had five bucks for every numbskull right-winger who’s demanded on the internet today that Hager be prosecuted for “receiving stolen property” …
I believe that idea was explored a little by some lawyerly types at the time of the publication, but it was generally considered that the data wouldn't necessarily count as "goods" for the purposes of the act.
...although I think the stolen hard drive that Slater received would be. Although I don't think it was proven that it was stolen.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to nzlemming,
Unless he witnessed the crime, that holds little water. Getting information from someone else is not a crime.
From the point of view of the investigation he has acknowledged that he communicated with the hacker and that he received a USB stick from the hacker. Both those thing (the communications and USB stick) could very well be key in identifying the hacker.
Whatever it is they were after they were able to satisfy a judge that it was material to the case - the police don't have the power to take this action unilaterally (as I believe they do in some cases in the UK for example).
Obviously Hager's lawyers were able to make the police aware that they would be challenging the warrant and action and police have sealed the evidence until that's ruled on (although they may have taken that action on their own accord, it's unclear).
Which the police deliberately avoided by waiting until Hager was publicly not in residence,
That may be the case, but equally it may not. We have no information about when the warrant was granted, what resources were required for the search or what police process in these cases usually is.
I’m also concerned that these “specialists” (your term) took 10 hours to turn over what is a fairly modest house. That’s 50 man hours spent on a witness in a case that carries a maximum of 7 years. That’s overkill, and therefore intimidation, and all your devil’s advocacy cannot sweep that aside.
The thing is - we have no context at all for how usual or unusual this is. We don't know what items the police believed they were looking for, what processes were used during that search, whether all officers were involved for the whole time, what downtime there was.
Again - we literally know nothing about this case, nor what is normal for a case like this. All we have is guesses and speculation. There are plenty of things that could be wrong and improper about this, but until we know more I think it's unreasonable to assume the worst.
If the complainant were not Slater, and the content were not political and the 'witness' was not a journalist we have no idea if the process would be the same - I don't find it difficult to believe that it would be.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to nzlemming,
So what has that to do with Hager?
He likely has material evidence of the crime.
I don't think the law does (or should) give journalists an outright exemption from police searches, but all reasonable protections under law should be explored properly in court.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to Russell Brown,
most “unofficial” information will be “stolen” to some degree. It annoys me seeing one or two journalists whove made great use of leaks in the past seeming to forget that.
I guess the difference is knowledge and intent?
The people who steal and leak information already know what they have. In the case of this hacker it seems more likely that the discovery of material with journalistic merit was a byproduct of the theft, not the reason for it.
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Hard News: Doing over the witness, in reply to Trevor Nicholls,
..which is what blubber-byproduct does every time he touches a keyboard.
A fair point perhaps :)