Police granted extended power to investigate David Miranda’s seized material

Paul Lawrance
Activist Post

The Justice High Court on Friday ruled that the material seized from David Miranda, Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald’s partner, would now be under extended investigation by metropolitan police to find any wrongdoing related to terrorism and breaches of the Official Secrets Act.

A laptop, hard drive and multiple memory sticks were taken from Miranda by UK authorities at London’s Heathrow airport on August 18 during a nine-hour detainment under the Terrorism Act of 2000.

Miranda had been acting as a courier on behalf of Greenwald and was on his way back to Rio de Janeiro after meeting with documentary film maker Laura Poitras in Berlin.

Acting as a witness, Deputy National Security Adviser, Oliver Robbins, told judges that the information Miranda was carrying could pose a risk to the lives of UK intelligence officers and their family members.

The Guardian reports:

Release of the data, Robbins said, would render spies and their families vulnerable to attacks or even recruitment by terrorists and hostile intelligence agencies. He said the government had so far managed to access a portion of the encrypted files on the hard drive seized from Miranda which he said contained approximately 58,000 highly classified UK intelligence documents.

Prior to the hearing on Friday inspections of the seized materials were allowed under limited grounds of national security.

The solicitor for Miranda’s law firm said outside the court that, “The Home Office and Metropolitan police have lodged evidence with the court in which they make sweeping assertions about national security threats which they said entitled them to look at the materials seized, but they have said that they cannot provide further details in open court. Mr Miranda does not accept the assertions they have made and is disappointed that the UK government is attempting to justify the use of terrorist powers by making what appear to be unfounded assertions.”

Miranda and his lawyers will continue to fight his detention in court claiming abuse of Schedule 7 under the Terrorism Act 2000 and other human rights violations.

Paul Lawrance writes for Eyes Open Report where this first appeared.