Durham Police and the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) made “repeated and entirely unjustified” attempts to put two journalists under surveillance without seeking judicial authorization, a court was told. The Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) heard on Wednesday that Durham Constabulary and the PSNI engaged in a “covert strategy” to identify confidential informant that provided a leaked document used in documentary film that exposed collusion between the PSNI and a paramilitary group. Journalists Trevor Birney and Barry McCaffrey were arrested by Durham Police and the PSNI in 2018, after they released a documentary, No stone unturned, exposing police failures to investigate the murder of six innocent people in Loughinisland, County Down by the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF). Durham Police, working with the PSNI  raided the journalist’s homes, the Film Production Company, Fine Point Films, and seized computers, notes, mobile phones and terabytes of journalistic data.

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