Australian police will have power to secretly search homes
Simon Benson
The Daily Telegraph
March 5, 2009
Police will be allowed to secretly search suspects’ homes and remotely access their home computers for a month under the most draconian covert operation laws the state has seen.
[efoods]And no one will know, because of a provision allowing investigators to keep those being spied on in the dark for up to three years.
The laws, which give police greater power to deal with criminals than they have to use against suspected terrorists, were introduced into Parliament without warning by the Government yesterday as part of a crackdown on criminal gangs. However, they drew immediate criticism from civil libertarians, who claimed it was an invasion of personal freedom and from the NSW Opposition, who claimed they wouldn’t work.
Premier Nathan Rees said NSW would be the first jurisdiction in Australia to adopt the covert search warrants, modelled on Commonwealth anti-terrorism legislation.
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