PPA officer fined after bugging meeting room to eavesdrop on colleagues

A Police and Border Guard Board (PPA) officer has been fined €2,000 and has to pay legal costs of a further €1,200 after being found guilty of bugging a meeting room at a police station in Pärnu.
Pärnu Postimees reports that the uniformed officer, who for legal reasons cannot be named and had been in the job for over 25 years and had no previous criminal or misdemeanor record, had been charged with a stalking offense which could have led to jail time, but the defendant entered into a plea deal.
Western District Prosecutor Elle Keeman concurred with the defendant's lawyer that there was no evidence that entering a plea bargain and winding up criminal proceedings would have led to recidivism, and this, plus the defendant's remorse and the fact that it was a one-off incident, led to the fine.
Pärnu Postimees reports that the officer had on two occasions in April and May this year installed a bugging device with a 50-meter reception radius in a meeting room at the PPA building in Pärnu, without permission to do so.
The defendant said that this had been in an effort to resolve work-related issues in regard to a group led by a colleague, and conceded that this was not the ideal method to have used – both the colleague and other team members felt the act was not committed out of malice and was done in an effort to resolve a problem, and the defendants apology over the matter was accepted.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte
Source: Pärnu Postimees