TRANSCRIPT- of Conversation with Kathy Tomlinson and D
January/ 02/ 02
. She begins speaking of what had happened with the story that I had
given to her while she was at CBC. I had met with her on July the 19th-2001
and hand delivered the story that she then returned to A.P. Watt on Dec-21-01.
During the July 19th meeting, “K” informed me “D”, that based
on what I had told her, she had a reporter interview Gary Tidsbury as he had
just been cleared of all charges. During this interview K had arranged that the
reporter would ask Gary Tidsbury if Murrin was in fact, an RCMP informant/agent.
This is a poor quality recording but there is no doubt that the original could
be amplified to improve the sound.
Tape
counter – 847 of the duplicate, is the start of the entire conversation and
the volume is then somewhat enhanced when starting from here. The first few
seconds of the conversation were missed but it picks up immediately when I ask
why after Tomlinson had told me that they were not willing to do anything with
this.
D- Did they say why or?
K---/////(unclear) well----
D---Did they give you a response or did they just say no we’re not interested?
K---They didn’t want to put any time into it because it was a longshot.
D---What part was the long shot?
K----Well, its being able to-we talked about this before, I mean- being able to actually go on the air with anything comprehensive would take a lot of proving, a lot of time and they didn’t want to invest in it –so that’s it.
D- -Uhm- He’d kind of admitted it to one of your reporters to begin with, but that wasn’t enough for them to go on?
K---No.
D----Really! Did they -, did they know that, the person making----
K---Yaa- yaa
D----Oh !- So the person making the decision knew that- that was admitted but uh
K----But I mean you got to understand that there are a lot of stories that are pitched right, and a lot of stories aren’t done, and that’s sort of the way it works. You know, that’s all you can do is take a stab at it and if you get the time you can do it and if you don’t get the time you have to move on and that’s sort of what happened there.
D----Oh yaa, and uhm, there’d be no way of presenting this in a different light or in any different kind of a way that --…?
K----You mean to them?
D---Yaa.
K----Well Uh, I don’t think so, they weren’t interested in it. They had done a story, the same people who run the show there had a story a little while before that about how sh- -,how Mr. Murrin had been-,, uh uh ,unfairly prosecuted.
D----Oh right.
K-----I don’t know if you remember it ,it--, was about how the informant was .
D-----Oh yaa , right Doug Martin.
K-----Yaa, so there, that was-- they put a lot of time into that story and they felt that’s pretty much what that story should have been.
D-----And this story was kind of counter to what they’d already done then I take it?
K-----Can you hang on for one second?
D-----Yaa
Phone rings and Kathy talks on another line. Tape counter- 970
K-
Sorry about that.
D-
That’s OK.
K-
Uhm .so they are just not
interested in your story.
D---But
Right O.K. but I was just trying to understand why bec--- so I don’t run into
this again.
K---They have a lot of other things, they have a whole bunch of stories on the go.
D---
Yaa and ah ---
K---They’ve
done a Murrin story right.
D---Ya
–ya- and I had noticed that they had done a story with that other slant, yes I
had noticed that, and I wondered if that had any bearing on it that they already
did a –
K
It might have, now they didn’t say that to me but it might have. One of
the people involved in doing that story is one of the bosses of the show.
D----Oh
right.
K----So
they didn’t say that to me but
D-----Right
well that’s what I was wondering and I’m kind of trying to read between the lines here and not to run
into this again and
K----You
got a tough--You’ve got a tough sell in general right, because- It is a long
shot, it would take a lot of research
D----Yaa
O.K. but
K----To
verify
D----O.K.
right –but- the long shot part here I thought had kind of not been so long
when uhm -ah –Tidsbury had admitted to that reporter that Murrin ---
K----But
that in it self is not—that doesn’t just doesn’t change anything.
K----Just
because the guy’s an informant doesn’t mean anything. It could just mean
that’s what he does – so what.
Tape counter –994
D-
Did Tidsbury say that he was his handler or he didn’t go that far?
K---No
he didn’t go that far, all he did was confirm that he was an informant, but
you have to understand that there must be a lot more ---
D---Yaa—
K---verified
in order to prove your theory right
D----Uhm
well
K---Yaa
there would, I’m telling you that and the fact that he is an informant himself
is not enough .-- --(unclear)--
D---How
about if Tidsbury had admitted that he was the handler of that informant?
K----Oh
I don’t know, I don’t know that would take time.
D-----It
would have just have taken another question, he did answer that, would he answer
again? No body’s ever ---?
K----Maybe,
but –the whole point is that unless you have the support of the boss ,
they’re not going to go with
that. ( Unclear)--sentence----first you need the support of your boss to say yaa
ok work on it _____--So Who knows what happened.
D----Right
O.K. which is what I was just getting at, if I understood what happened here I
would not present in that type of a way at all to anyone else like even as
you’re saying you have a W-5 program there, I don’t think it’s worth
presenting in the same way to them even to uh, even to enquire about doing it
because I think your results will be the same.
K----It’s
an uphill battle. Most people don’t believe that police are corrupt, a lot of
people believe that cops are good.
D----Yaa
but by the same token, if nobody does anything about it we are stuck with
corrupt cops.
K---Yap
D---Uh-Huh
K----If
you come across anything that is easily verifiable and much more concrete, I’d
be happy to pitch it to my new boss.( Unclear)---
My other bosses---(unclear)
D----No
um, there are somethings, but again uhm .you are really looking for the absolute
cut and dried, you got the proof, here it is and just lay it out. You don’t
really want to be involved in the investigative end of looking for it kind of
thing.
K----Well
frankly I can’t be any more, not with the job that I’m currently hired for
but down the road ,---(unclear) ---- but it’s possible, just not right
now.
D---Right
Ok
K---(unclear)
D---like
you said it is going to take some work to but I had done some more checking
around.
A
person enters the phone booth and the conversation is even less clear, but Kathy
later ends up directing me to the Vancouver Sun .
I ask one more question. Tape Counter- 907
Q-----
Uhm- The one boss that did the story on the other way about Murrin there, is he
still on the program?
A-
Yaa
D---Is
he even worth approaching, er like if he himself could have been convinced there
is something to it would that have helped, or is that just a long shot too.
K-----Well,
I talked to him about it so I don’t know what,…
D-----Right,
but how much detail did you give him though, like you didn’t really tell him
too much or did you??? ---
K-…But
enough.
D----Right
K----(
Unclear)----
925-
ph-newsroom and stay in touch-604-609-0491
She recites Mailing address and fax #.
Q------Did you send all the copies back from that stuff I had given you or did you keep a copy?
Yes I sent the only one back.
Told her that I would send her an up date.
END-965