This video from Canada says about itself:
Quebec launches commission of inquiry into police spying on journalists
4 November 2016
Probe will have powers of a commission, including ability to call witnesses and hold public hearings. To read more: here.
By Conrad Landin in Britain:
Cops deleted files to cover up hacks
Wednesday 22nd March 2017
Whistleblower reveals spying on journalists and campaigners
UNDERCOVER cops deleted files from a police database to cover up the hacking of campaigners’ emails, a police whistleblower has alleged.
Officers reportedly deleted the files in May 2014 to conceal the fact that a police instructed operative had spied on journalists and environmental and social justice campaigners.
Scotland Yard’s national domestic extremism and disorder intelligence unit, which was behind the spying, is one of a number of covert squads under the scope of the upcoming Pitchford undercover policing inquiry.
Green peer Jenny Jones, who has raised the alarm about officers shredding files relating to her own surveillance, was provided with the information by the whistleblower in a letter, her spokesman confirmed to the Star yesterday.
Ms Jones’s lawyers confirmed with six of the 10 targeted activists that their email usernames and passwords were the same as those the whistleblower had stated.
Ms Jones then referred the whistleblower’s letter to the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) and the public inquiry team.
“The personal information within the letter is accurate and it could only have been obtained illegally,” she said.
“There is more than enough to justify a full-scale criminal investigation into the activities of these police officers and referral to a public inquiry.
“I have urged the IPCC to act quickly to secure further evidence and to find out how many people were victims of this nasty practice.”
An IPCC spokesman said the agency was “still assessing the scope of the investigation” and could not make further comment.
The whistleblower, who formerly worked for the covert unit, said passwords had been passed on by a “covert human intelligence source,” a term agencies use for their spies.
According to the Guardian newspaper, the unit worked with police in India who used hackers to illegally obtain passwords.
The upcoming inquiry will consider abusive practices including the deception of women activists into relationships with officers, and spying on trade unionists.
Inquiry chairman Sir Christopher Pitchford said: “I welcome Baroness Jones’s decision to bring these allegations to the attention of the inquiry.
“In my view, the IPCC is undoubtedly the right body to investigate … At present the inquiry is unaware of any connection between the allegations in this letter and the inquiry’s terms of reference.
“We would welcome the opportunity to speak with the author of the letter and I would urge that person to contact the inquiry on terms of confidentiality.”
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Thursday 6th April 2017
posted by Conrad Landin in Britain
Pitchford participant blasts undercover police for ‘preventing disclosure’
POLICE chiefs are using “blocking tactics” to “prevent disclosure,” a preliminary hearing of the undercover policing inquiry heard yesterday.
Christopher Pitchford, who is leading the inquiry into the conduct of officers deployed to spy on political groups, convened the session to hear arguments over whether the coppers should be allowed more time to prepare requests for anonymity.
The Metropolitan Police has said assessing the risk of disclosing officers’ real names and cover names has taken longer than anticipated, and a March 1 deadline was missed. It has also asked for the inquiry to be narrowed.
But in a powerful address to the hearing, inquiry core participant Kate Wilson said the police were “obstructing the goals” the probe was aiming for.
Ms Wilson is one of eight women deceived into relationships with undercover officers who won legal cases against the Met.
“We’re not strangers to the blocking tactics used by the Metropolitan Police to prevent disclosure,” she said.
Repeatedly interrupting her, Mr Pitchford told Ms Wilson to “distinguish” between the Met’s “incompetence and failure to plan” and “deliberate sabotage.”
In a reference to recent revelations that a Met unit may have shredded a warehouse of documents relating the scandal, Ms Wilson retorted: “Such as the destruction of documents?”
She said a friend and fellow core participant had recently died “without finding the truth,” and concluded: “We need to remember who is being investigated here. I’m flabbergasted at how much control the police have over the evidence and over the process.”
The Met’s barrister Jonathan Hall QC argued the police should have until October to apply for officers’ anonymity.
But the inquiry’s counsel David Barr QC warned that the police could be compelled to submit evidence under the 2005 Inquiries Act.
Mr Hall sought to assure Mr Pitchford the intention was “not to delay.”
He stressed that the Met had extensively co-operated with the inquiry.
Mr Hall also argued that the inquiry’s terms of reference were “flexible enough to [place] an intense focus on [elite undercover units] the SDS and the NPOIU.”
But the inquiry chairman suggested that if the centrality of the SDS was accepted, then the Met’s argument against the collection of submissions from every former SDS officer could fall.
“I’m finding it hard to accept that officers with a good or not good memory… will not have something relevant to say,” he told the hearing.
A lawyer acting for the National Police Chiefs’ Council said it was likely that anonymity applications from NPIOU officers would take even longer than those of the Met.
The hearing continues today.
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-0658-Top-officers-blocking-spycops-inquirys-work#.WOZH4mekIdU
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