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In emails to NRK and Dagbladet that arrived last summer, the sender (one or more) claims to be behind threats and vandalism for which Laila Bertheussen is accused.
Dagbladet published articles about these emails. NRK has also mentioned that such emails have been received without entering the content.
– Those who wrote the email claim to be behind threats and vandalism against Wara’s house. We tried to find out who the sender was and make contact. We said we wanted a meeting, but the sender did not respond, journalist Tormod Strand told the court on Wednesday.
WITNESS: Tormod Strand, NRK journalist.
Photo: Ole Berg-rest / NTB
– We inform PST about the email, but we do not forward it so as not to break the protection of the source. PST responded that they did not want to comment on the details of an ongoing case. After a general evaluation, we decided not to publish anything about the content. The main reason was that we could not identify the sender or senders, Strand said.
It was Bertheussen’s defenders who had summoned the NRK journalist and a Dagbladet journalist who testified at the trial.
I want emails to be sent
Dagbladet’s Steinar Solås Suvatne said that they had agreed to meet with the sender, but that this did not happen. He said it was Dagbladet who canceled this meeting.
Contact ended in June 2019.
Like NRK, Dagbladet will not provide the sender’s email address.
Defenders demand that journalists testify.
– We think it is important when someone takes responsibility and says they are behind it and also provides information as detailed as it does to Dagbladet and NRK. So it’s good to find out more about where it came from and who did it, Laila Bertheussen’s defender John Christian Elden tells NRK.
The court will decide Thursday if they require the information to be released.
Editors then go to court to defend source protection.
– We will explain NRK’s views on this in court, and I don’t want to go into detail on this now. But it is important for us to emphasize that source protection is crucial for the media to do its job. It’s a basic principle in a free society, says Marius Tetlie, who is the editor-in-chief of the NRK news division.
– Important principles
I HAD CONTACT: Steinar Solås Suvatne from Dagbladet said that they had agreed to meet with the sender of the emails, but this did not happen.
Photo: Ole Berg-rest / NTB
– The protection of sources and unpublished material are very important principles for the press, this also applies in this case. We will explain our opinion in court, says news editor Frode Hansen at Dagbladet.
In the emails, the sender claims to have eavesdropped on Bertheussen’s home and had access to the front door code, and that two threatening letters in the case were applied to dog urine. The prosecution believes that the sender, in their eyes Bertheussen, has unique knowledge of the case and must also be the person behind the threatening events.
The defendants believe the emails can prove Bertheussen’s innocence.
– But does it take a lot for the press to declare what they get from the councils and their sources?
– The court must decide on this. They should assess whether the boundary is present if they are in a situation where someone is about to be convicted of innocence because others have information that can prove their innocence, Elden responds.
He says that first and foremost they want to see all the information that they have been given, not just what is referenced in Dagbladet. In addition, they require that all metadata be provided, that is, information that can make it possible to trace the sender.
– Why do you think it should be delivered?
– There is information that has been given to the media where specific and detailed information of email addresses with which you are familiar has been provided and that you can investigate who they are. Clearly, it is of great interest to know who the people really are and who is behind it, says Elden.
The prosecution says they also want the media information to be published.
– We will support the petition, although we understand the protection of the press source, prosecutor Frederik Ranke told NRK.
This is what the law says
Defendants will argue that the third paragraph of Criminal Procedure Law § 125 allows this:
“When important interests of society dictate that the information be provided and it is of great importance to the resolution of the case, the court may, after a general evaluation, order the witness to give the name. If the author or source has revealed facts that were of social importance to make known, the witness can only be required to declare his name when there is a special requirement. “
But source protection is something the media holds up.
“Protection of sources is in many cases crucial for the media to be able to do their job and conduct critical and insightful journalism,” writes the Norwegian Publishers Association on the subject.
One of the most famous cases was when filmmaker Ulrik Imtiaz Rolfsen did not want PST to have access to unpublished material that had been seized in the investigation of Ubaydullah Hussain and an 18-year-old terrorism suspect.
The Supreme Court ruled that Rolfsen’s film project is at the heart of investigative journalism.
The protection of the source was thus weighed and deemed heavier than the wishes of PST.
