The surveillance you describe in the story about the Police Service of Northern Ireland targeting journalists (Journalists who were unlawfully spied on have ‘no doubt’ UK reporters are still targeted, 23 December) goes back years – and sometimes to absurd lengths. In the 1990s, I was a reporter/presenter for BBC Radio 4 working on a series called Famous For 15 Minutes – not exactly hard-nosed investigative journalism. We were interviewing a Northern Ireland skydiver who had survived a fall when his parachute failed to open. He didn’t want us coming to his home, so we booked a room in a hotel for the interview.
That evening, after he’d left, we were enjoying a drink in the hotel’s bar when two burly men began chatting us up. All seemed innocent, until their questions about what we were doing in Northern Ireland became more persistent, and it became obvious that they were police officers tasked with checking up on us. I suspect that by then they had already discovered that we were making an entirely inoffensive programme, and they were just going through the motions to enjoy a few drinks on expenses.
Jenni Mills
Milton Lilbourne, Wiltshire
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