POLICE chiefs have admitted hunting down journalists’ sources at least 12 times in three years.
Scotland’s national force revealed they had intercepted phone calls and billing data on seven individuals suspected of passing information to reporters, in addition to the four targeted during an illegal operation to find Sunday Mail sources in April. A bid to snoop on another was turned down.
Police Scotland revealed the information more than a year after the Scottish Newspaper Society asked for it under freedom of information legislation – and just days before police chiefs and ministers are grilled at Holyrood over the force’s illegal attempt to find our sources.
