A Priest, a Teacher and an organic Farmer walk into a spy base
Crown to seek damages from spy base trio
The Crown has filed court papers seeking damages from three men acquitted over damage they caused to equipment at the Waihopai spy base near Blenheim in 2008.
Teacher Adrian Leason, Dominican friar Peter Murnane, and farmer Sam Land were found not guilty in April on charges of burglary and wilful damage of the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) base.
Incredible, the security services have time and resources to go after a Priest, a Teacher and an organic Farmer after their righteous protest against a spy base that enables the Americans to commit war crimes and allow them to spy on NZers via the echelon system, yet the security services in this country DON'T have the time and resources to go after the politically connected Momentum Consulting Group for appointing fantasists like Wilce to the top scientific advisor role in the NZ Military!
Who has done more damage to our security? 3 Protesters who popped a satellite cover or a Corporate recruitment company that didn't even bother to fact check the CV of a clown?
posted by Bomber @ 7:41 am
16 comments
16 Comments:
The GCSB base is (criminally negligently)inadequately protected from Teachers, Organic farmers, priests and i recall from Mikey Havocs and Newsboys.
Pathetic.
The protestors.
It was an appalling decision, based on trite emotions, not reasoned logic. Religous fundamentalists like the ploughshares should be treated the same as you or I in the courts, regardless of who they target and what they believe.
They must pay the fine. Simple. Take responsibility for their actions. Its clear cut.
Hilarious! Those guys whop popped the spy base should be given meddels!
If it was just the GCSB using the base, it would probably still be a breach of privacy. However, by allowing Americans to use it too our government is committing treason.
Very good point Bomber!
The most important part of this discussion is that the Government in a typically knee jerk fashion is talking about removing the defence that these brave if slightly dotty people used. Much as they removed the defence of provocation after it was used unsuccessfully by Clayton Weatherstone. Stupid, small minded and extremely dangerous this is dog whistle politics at its worst. These people posed an argument that a jury of their peers, presented with high quality arguments from both sides, accepted and that is and should be that!
Simon,
Yes, the whole thing is just the government randomly responding to perceived "loop holes" in the law.
There's no thinking or coherent policy here, on the government's behalf, at all. Which is typical, of course.
Watch the govt spend more on prosecuting those guys than they would ever get back in fines. Whats the point?
The "Crown" has decided to prosecute. Does anyone know the actual names of which members of "the Crown" have made this decsion to prosecute? It's just that we seem to need to know all those Joe Publics that have been charged with various crimes (yet not yet been found guilty), but not the names of the dickheads that have made decisions such as this. I'd quite like to know who they are....so that when they pop up in some other capacity, now or in the futuer (perhaps as part of the Police Complaints Authority, or as a board member of the BSA, or any other similar sort of body), they can't hide behind the anonymity of their poistion...especially since that position is filled by different people over time.
If I actually knew the names, I'm quite sure I'd find he/she/there have made dickhead decisions in some former capacity somewhere. And just as there are serial criminals, serial politicians, etc., there are also serial dickhead Public Servants. So is it Chris Finlayson and/or David Collins QC, and him/them alone - I'd like to know so that when David Collin moves on, or pops up somewhere else (maybe as Film Censor, or Chief Bullshit Artist of the Ministry of Silly Walks), I can be unsurprised at the next dickhead decision!
Unlike the national media, I actually sat through most of the trial last year. and the big thing that the media missed was that the GSSB didnt even show up and give evidence. There was NO EVIDENCE from the owners of the base. NOTHING. they didn't show up. the judge told the jury to weigh up the evidence, and since they didnt hear any from the owners of the property, they went with the defence. They kinda had to really!
Theyre desperate that they dont get away scot free with it!
Excellent idea by the state to pursue these miscreants.
Unfortunately they'll get nothing more that a slap on the back of the hand but this is NZ of course where we don't really take national security very seriously
Bullshit bravado of course. If they were to try this on a US base they'd be looking at some jail time which is why they chose NZ.
If they were to try this on a US base they'd be looking at some jail time which is why they chose NZ.
They did the act because NZ is their HOME, thats why.
Anyone thinking the ploughshares mob were barking up the wrong tree about NZ providing SIGINT (signals intelligence) to amerika so that Afghani wedding parties can be targetted or SAS hit squads can murder families in their sleep should wise up. Two weeks ago the Pentagon announced it was going to buy up all 100,000 copies of Anthony Shaffer's just published "Operation Dark Heart" and pulp them after which the publishers would be forced to release a heavily redacted version. see: http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/2010/09/behind_the_censor.html
But the book is already in the public domain. Excerpts can be found at: http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/2010/09/dark-contrast.pdf
Here is one piece that was cut out:
"Our reports were written without the exact source of the info to
protect that source. We separated out the chaff and gave out just the
kernel. However, the details related to sourcing were hugely impor-
tant to understanding the big picture.
"It would have to stay within the holdings of the LTC. No Kiwis,"
I said. New Zealand Defence Force troops were providing intelli-
gence, as well as combat support, as part of the International Security
Assistance Force (ISAF) troops in the country.
Dave nodded. "In exchange, I will make sure you get immediate
coverage or answers we can pull directly from our access to raw SIG-
INT. We would use the combined data to put together a package on
each guy. Then decisions could be made jointly." For Dave, that
meant details of when the bad guys were talking to each other, how
often, and where they were talking from, a kinda "friends and family"
network for terrorists. The phone numbers they were using, when
combined with our HUMINT data, were hugely important to un-
derstanding the operational environment-the "spiderweb" of the ter-
rorist infrastructure that we had to understand so we could act in a
smart, cohesive fashion.
For Dave to offer to distribute raw data outside the NSA system,
even though it would remain within the top secret security network,
was also a radical move. Normally, the Fort got the raw, unanalyzed
intercepts first and then they gave people like Dave what they thought
he needed in the form of finished or near finished reports, but Dave
had cut a deal with them. He was getting everything so that his hybrid
team of New Zealand and U.S. SIGINT specialists could parse it and
review it to establish their own intel. In promising me access to their
intercepts, Dave was stepping way, way, way out on a limb.
In my mind, I could just hear the screaming in Clarendon (DIA
Operations Support Center) and at the Fort (Fort Meade, Maryland,
NSA HQ) if they knew about this level of information exchange.
"Where do you propose to keep it?" I asked. . . ."
I THOUGHT IT WOS 10,000 COPIES IN THE PAPER?
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