F.B.I. urges Aust, to use more phone ‘bugs’

Press, 3 February 1986, Page 18

F.B.I. urges Aust, to use more phone ‘bugs’

NZPA-AAP Melbourne Australia is the weak link in international organised crime investigations because it has failed to make full use of telephone tapping techniques, according to the director of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigations. During a visit to Australia, Judge William H. Webster said Australia’s restricted use of electronic surveillance could be hampering international agencies trying to track down drug traffickers. International traffickers and others in illegal activities tended to work where law enforcement was dess intense or less effective. Australians were now trafficking in drugs, Australia being one of the main routes by which drugs left Thailand’s Golden Triangle. At present only the Federal police had the power to use telephone taps on drug importation matters after seeking clearance from the Attorney-Gen-

eral. Judge Webster said telephone tapping could and should be regulated and needed neutral magistrates to approve wire taps and microphone surveillances.

Taps had helped the F. 8.1. to reach the highlyinsulated areas of the Godfather types in organised crime in the United States. The bureau made extensive use of sensitive techniques, including undercover agents and court-authorised electronic surveillance methods. “In dealing with criminal enterprises the important thing is to get beyond the streets, to reach up into the upper echelons of organised criminal enterprise,” Judge Webster said. This applied to narcotics cartels, traditional organised crime families, the Mafia, the Cosa Nostra sect or any of the nontraditlonal groups, including the Hell’s Angels or prison groups. It also applied to tracking down Illicit associa-

tions in labour racketeering or corruption of public offices. “To do that you need staying power and the effective use of some sensitive techniques including the informant — the undercover agent —• and court-authorised electronic surveillance,” Judge Webster said. The surveillance was also used as in-court evidence. "We have been able to bring indictments and in most cases convictions at the very highest levels against every organised crime family in the United States.” However, surveillance techniques did not "unreasonably intrude” upon civil liberties. Judge Webster is the third director of the F. 8.1., and ' the first to speak publicly to the Australian news media. He was speaking in Melbourne before returning to the United States from the first Aslan Pacific F. 8.1. National Academy retraining session in Bangkok.