Former Telemedia Exec sets the record straight

dean boyce

Dean Boyce, the former Chair of BTL’s Executive Committee, was singled out by the Prime Minister. But when we spoke to Boyce this evening, he categorically denied that during his tenure, Telemedia was engaged in wire tapping.

Dean Boyce, Former Chairman, Exec. Com., BTL

“Whilst at BTL, that was 2005 thru to 2009 there was no live eavesdropping of telephone calls at all.  What did happen is that is we would receive requests from the Police if somebody, for example, had been murdered or they’ve been kidnapped, they would request information on call details, but calls from the victim’s phone or to the victim’s phone.  Those requests would be received at the senior level within the company, a Head of Department.  They would then be logged and processed – those applications processed.  We would then provide the information and would include something similar to an invoice that you would receive at the end of the month and not called numbers but numbers that had called into that telephone.  And we would also try – where we’d identified a particular phone number that the police were interested in that had, for example, called into the victim’s phone, we would also try to put a name to that by examining our records. But that was all we did.  There were certainly no requests of any description that I received during my time for from the police or anybody else for tapping of phones.  And in fact, if it had been going on and somebody at thee company had been undertaking that activity that would have undoubtedly been a disciplinary offense and probably even termination.”

Marion Ali

“Did that ever happen, to your knowledge?”

Dean Boyce

“I was certainly not aware of any interception room in Raccoon Police Station or anywhere else.  I wasn’t requested by a politician, by the police or anybody else for live wire tapping.  It’s worth clarifying this because I’m not saying here that I’m necessarily for or against tapping of phones.  I’m sure there might be some circumstances where it could be justified but I wouldn’t want decisions to be made based upon the false premise that it’s been happening in the past.”

We’ll have much more on the House debate later in the newscast.