Slashdot Mirror
Police Allegedly Threaten A UK Photographer With Seizure Of All His Computers (wordpress.com)
Andy Smith is a Scotland-based news photographer (and a long-time reader of Slashdot). He writes
Recently the police wanted to seize some of my work photos to use as evidence in a prosecution... Rather than trying (and likely failing) to get a warrant to seize the photos, the prosecutor used a tactic that nobody had heard of before: He got a warrant to seize all of my cameras, computers, memory cards, etc, even though the photos were in a secure location, not at my home or in my possession. I was then given 24 hours to retrieve and hand over the photos, or the police would raid my home and take everything, effectively ending my career.
His blog post describes erasing every computer and memory card, though he believes the police only wanted the leverage that came from threatening to seize them. But the journalists' union advised him to surrender the photos, since otherwise his equipment could be held for over a year -- so he complied. "I regret my decision. Everyone on this side of the case has reassured me that it was the right thing to do, but it wasn't."
"As for the warrant, it remains active, with no time limit. I now conduct my work knowing that the police could raid my home at any time, without warning, and take everything."
His blog post describes erasing every computer and memory card, though he believes the police only wanted the leverage that came from threatening to seize them. But the journalists' union advised him to surrender the photos, since otherwise his equipment could be held for over a year -- so he complied. "I regret my decision. Everyone on this side of the case has reassured me that it was the right thing to do, but it wasn't."
"As for the warrant, it remains active, with no time limit. I now conduct my work knowing that the police could raid my home at any time, without warning, and take everything."
From you blog...
I'd just finished covering a trial at the local sheriff court when there was an altercation between people involved in the trial. I photographed the incident.
Why not just PUBLISH the photos?
It happened in the public court.
Publishing would give the police, and everyone else access to what happened that day.
As a reporter why would you take the photo's and then try and hide them? Did you maybe have an interest in protecting one of the parties involved?
I have to return some videotapes...
And what we're seeing in Turkey isn't looking too hot either, and the Europeans have long been trying to make Turkey out to be a European nation.
Actually, the US has pressed on for Turkish membership in EU for decades:
Washington's support for Ankara on the issue of Turkish membership in the EU became part of the agenda of U.S.-Turkish
bilateral relations in the late 1980s. However, it vvas during the course of the next decade that American offcials began to engage in
intensive lobbying efforts among key U.S. allies in Europe to promote Turkey's EU aspirations.
[...]
http://dergiler.ankara.edu.tr/...