Top officials in Security Police face charges in telephone surveillance case

Seppo Nevala

Petri Knape

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Three top officials in Finland’s Security Police (SUPO) and the former head of the security unit of the telecommunications service provider Sonera are to be charged in a case involving suspected illegal telecommunications surveillance.
      The head of SUPO, Seppo Nevala, and Petri Knape, the head of the operative section of SUPO, as well as the head of SUPO’s regional unit are to be charged with malfeasance.
      The former head of the Sonera security unit, Juha E. Miettinen, and the regional head of SUPO face charges of aggravated violation of communications privacy.
      Investigators believe that telecommunications records of five Sonera customers were given to SUPO in November 2000 without just cause. At the time it was suspected that a foreign espionage operation against Sonera was under preparation.
     
The decision to prosecute was announced on Monday by State Prosecutor Jukka Rappe.
      The trial itself is likely to be held behind closed doors, as the case involves matters of national security.
      All of the suspects have denied any wrongdoing. Both Nevala and Knape have been suspended from their jobs since early September.
      The victims of the suspected crimes are five Sonera mobile phone subscribers. Prosecutors are protecting their identities from the public.
     
The case dates back to the autumn of 2000 when the SUPO regional chief met with Sonera head of security Juha E. Miettinen. SUPO wanted to warn Sonera about an espionage operation involving Russia and Western countries.
      According to the SUPO regional chief, Miettinen gave him telephone records of calls made from the mobile phones of five people in November 2000. Miettinen has said that the SUPO regional chief asked for the information.
      The regional chief recalled the matter two years later, and in the autumn of 2002 he reported the contacts that he had with the Sonera head of security to his immediate superior, Petri Knape.
      The apparent reason was a report in Helsingin Sanomat at the time concerning Miettinen’s activities in Sonera. He had led an operation to collect telephone records of contacts between Sonera’s own personnel and outsiders in 2000 and 2001.
      Knape and Seppo Nevala then concluded that nothing illegal had taken place.
     
The Sonera connection came up again in a discussion between the Security Police and the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI), in the late summer of 2003.
      Sonera records indicated that information of the telephone records of certain individuals suspected of involvement in espionage had been illegally printed out and given to the Security Police.
      SUPO gave a report on the matter to the Prosecutor-General’s office just under a year after the first reports on the matter were drawn up.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  State Prosecutor to decide on possible charges in Security Police telecom case (16.9.2004)
  Security Police suspends head of operative section Petri Knape (10.9.2004)
  Head of Security Police suspended - decision on deputy coming later (8.9.2004)
  Security Police kept internal report on phone tracing secret for nearly a year (27.8.2004)
  Security Police leadership suspected of concealing involvement in Sonera snooping (26.8.2004)
  Allegations of illegal tracing of phone records at Sonera to go to trial in autumn (8.4.2004)

Helsingin Sanomat