Federal Cops Dig Their Heels In On Media Raids And Assert It’s All Fine & Cool

Here’s something fun: The Australian Federal Police has insisted that its raids on the ABC and the Canberra home of a News Corp journalist were not intended to intimidate the media, in a wild press conference which involved Acting Commissioner Neil Gaughan telling the press the raids had not been initiated by the government.

Australian Federal Police swarmed into ABC’s Sydney offices on Wednesday, prompting a wild skirmish over the state of media freedom in Australia. Australian journalism great Kerry O’Brien said the message being sent was clear: “this will happen to you if you are about to become a whistleblower.”

Acting Commissioner Gaughan said in a press conference on Thursday afternoon that police had first told the Coalition government they would be investigating the leaking of sensitive material more than a year ago, but that no updates had been provided to the government since then.

Gaughan also said he would not “rule in or rule out anyone subject to further charges,” which is fun news for enthusiasts of press freedom everywhere.

“It’s important to say we’re in the evidence collection phase of the investigation. Now, clearly, we’ve got a long way to go,” he said.

Gaughan defended the actions of police, saying the force was merely upholding the law and struck out at the ABC for turning it into a public display.

“The only way it was turned into a public display was based on what the ABC did when we arrived yesterday,” he said, “the ABC filmed it, which is their right, and they continued to tweet during the execution.”  

ABC Investigations Editor John Lyons livetweeted the whole thing and, according to his timeline, police didn’t notice he was doing that until 90 minutes into the event.

Gaughan said more search warrants may be implemented in the future, while The Australian reports the cops had actually planned to go ahead with another raid today – making it three in three days – but decided against it. You can probably guess why.

When asked by media if it was a crime to publish leaked documents, Gaughan said “yes, it can be.”

The Labor Party has asked for a briefing and has flirted with the idea of a Senate inquiry if possible. Meanwhile, the rest of the world has been clocking in, too. The BBC issued a statement calling the raid on the ABC “an attack on press freedom” which it found “deeply troubling.” Also, we made the New York Times, baby!!!

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