Exposition by recording? Click to follow the info.
130806 Sunday Business post Tape of alleged racial abuse is admissible in case By Kieron Wood
The Barristers Professional Conduct Tribunal has ruled that a recording of a phone call by a banister allegedly racially abusing his Romanian client is admissible in proceedings for professional misconduct. The Romanian, who cannot be named, complained in 2004 about a barrister after the lawyer was allegedly recorded telling his secretary that “scumbag Romanians” should be “put in a fucking ship and fucked the fuck out of this country altogether”. The Romanian man had been involved in family law proceedings involving his five- year-old daughter. He has since been deported, after serving two months of a two-year prison sentence for handling stolen property. The man’s wife, their daughter and his 17-year-old son stayed in Ireland. The Bar Council is investigating claims that the barrister, who was acting for the wife, divulged private information about him in a phone call to his secretary The woman tape-recorded the remarks. Family law cases are heard in private and nobody is allowed to reveal details of proceedings to third parties. The barrister allegedly told his secretary that Romanians should be “fucked out back where you came from and let flicking whoever is still in power in Romania sort you all out”. He was alleged to have said that Romanians were “on every fiddle that’s going”, and that they were as trustworthy as scorpions. The barrister’s counsel argued that the tape was inadmissible because it had been made without his consent, so was in breach of the Postal and Telecommunications Services Act 1983. He also claimed that it violated the barrister’s constitutional right to privacy and breathed the European Convention on Human Rights. But the tribunal ruled that the 1983 act had been amended by the Interception of Postal Packets and Telecommunications Messages (Regulation) Act 1993. Under that legislation, a telephone conversation can be legally recorded by one of the parties involved, without the other’s consent. Tribunal chairman John Gleeson SC said: “The fact that one party to a telephone conversation records it does not, in the opinion of the tribunal, give rise to a constitutional difficulty or a breach of the European Convention on Human Rights. “After all, a party to a telephone conversation is always capable of giving evidence of the contents of that conversation without any recording apparatus, whether by making a contemporaneous note or by simply recalling in evidence what was said during the conversation.” The hearing of the complaint will now go ahead in private at a future date. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Read the Acts!! -----------------------------------------------------Click here! Postal and Telecommunications Services Act 1983 Prohibition on interception of telecommunications messages.
Part 5 Section 98. —(1) A person who—
( a ) intercepts or attempts to intercept, or ( b ) authorises, suffers or permits another person to intercept, or ( c ) does anything that will enable him or another person to intercept, telecommunications messages being transmitted by the company or who discloses the existence, substance or purport of any such message which has been intercepted or uses for any purpose any information obtained from any such message shall be guilty of an offence. (2) Subsection (1) shall not apply to any person who is acting— ( a ) (i) for the purpose of an investigation by a member of the Garda SĂochĂĄna of a suspected offence under section 13 of the Post Office (Amendment) Act, 1951 (which refers to telecommunications messages of an obscene, menacing or similar character) on the complaint of a person claiming to have received such a message, or (ii) in pursuance of a direction issued by the Minister under section 110, or (iii) under other lawful authority, or ( b ) in the course of and to the extent required by his operating duties or duties for or in connection with the installation or maintenance of a line, apparatus or equipment for the transmission of telecommunications messages by the company. ( 3 ) ( a ) The company may, with the consent of the Minister, make regulations to carry out the intentions of this section in so far as concerns
members of its staff. ( b ) The Minister, after consultation with the company, may direct the company to make regulations under paragraph (a) or to amend or revoke regulations made under that paragraph and the company shall comply with that direction. ( c ) A person who contravenes any regulation under this subsection shall be guilty of an offence. ( 4 ) ( a ) The Minister may make regulations prohibiting the provision or operation of overhearing facilities in relation to any apparatus (including private branch telephone exchanges) connected to the network of the company otherwise than in accordance with such conditions as he considers to be reasonable and prescribes in the regulations. ( b ) A person who contravenes any regulation under this subsection shall be guilty of an offence. (5) In this section, "interception" means listening to, or recording by any means, or acquiring the substance or purport of, any telecommunications message without the agreement of the person on whose behalf that message is transmitted by the company and of the person intended by him to receive that message.
1983 Act which required agreement of BOTH parties to the recording of a phone conversation
READ the 1993
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------act Changes!! Click Here!! ------------------------------------------------
Interception of Postal Packets and Telecommunications Messages (Regulation) Act 1993. Amendment 13. —(1) The reference in subsection (2) of section 98 of Act of of the Act of 1983 to subsection (1) of that section shall 1983.
be deemed to include a reference to section 45 of the Telegraph Act, 1863, the second paragraph of section 11 of the Post Office (Protection) Act, 1884, and
subsection (5) (inserted by subsection (3) of this section) of the said section 98. (2) The following subsections are hereby inserted after subsection (2) of section 98 of the Act of 1983: "(2A) A person employed by the company who discloses to any person any information concerning the use made of telecommunications services provided for any other person by the company shall be guilty of an offence unless the disclosure is made— ( a ) at the request or with the consent of that other person, ( b ) for the prevention or detection of crime or for the purpose of any criminal proceedings, ( c ) in the interests of the security of the State, ( d ) in pursuance of an order of a court, ( e ) for the purpose of civil proceedings in any court, or ( f ) to another person to whom he is required, in the course of his duty as such employee, to make such disclosure. (2B) A request by a member of the Garda Síochána to a person employed by the company to make a disclosure in accordance with the provisions of subsection (2A) shall be in writing and be signed by a member of the Garda Síochána not below the rank of chief superintendent. (2C) A request by an officer of the Defence Forces to a person employed by the company to make a disclosure in accordance with the provisions of subsection (2A) shall be in writing and be signed by an officer of the Permanent Defence Force who holds an army rank not below that of colonel.". (3) The following subsections are hereby substituted for subsection (5) of the said section 98: "(5) A person who discloses the existence, substance or purport of a telecommunications message that was transmitted by the Minister before the vesting day and intercepted or who uses for any purpose any information
obtained from any such message shall be guilty of an offence. (6) In this section 'intercept' means listen to, or record by any means, in the course of its transmission, a telecommunications message but does not include such listening or recording where either the person on whose behalf the message is transmitted or the person intended to receive the message has consented to the listening or recording, and cognate words shall be construed accordingly. ".
1993 Act which requires agreement of EITHER or BOTH parties to the recording of a phone conversation.
click Here to return to TOP!