To think Lucy Connolly has been made an example of?

[SouthernFashionista]

Have any of you read this article about Lucy Connolly who tweeted inflammatory comments following the Southport murders? I have to admit that at the time I was fully supportive of having her locked up, with the key thrown away. But reading this article made me view it all a little differently. Surely she has done her time?
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/04/04/lucy-connolly-southport-riots-axel-rudakubana-taylor-swift/

I can't find any evidence of this, do you have a link?

But how come no deaths on the NHS tipped her over the edge and her focus was about hotels not burning hospitals? Odd that? This was choice behaviour.

It would have been silly to plead not guilty considering the evidence.

Given the guilty plea, the sentence is harsh as fuck.

People applauding it might want to think carefully, given that it's not much of a stretch for women, particularly in Scotland, to get custodial sentences for, for instance, posting about single sex spaces.

Meanwhile, men get to look at child abuse images, and actually assault children, and get lesser or no custodial sentences.

I think Starmer thought if he cracked down hard and made an example of a view people, it would shut down a lot of discontent about immigration, asylum and changing demographics. But it won't, people just learn to be a bit more coded - and they also feel a lot more victimised and angry.

@ArtTheClown

Given the guilty plea, the sentence is harsh as fuck.

As has been repeated many times on the thread, it was lenient given the sentencing guidelines for the crime.

As has been repeated many times on the thread, it was lenient given the sentencing guidelines for the crime.

Yet the sentening guidelines for racial hatred offenses have community orders as a sentencing starting point, so I'm going to have do disagree, regardless of how many times that has been repeated.

Completely agree @ArtTheClown

You can disagree as much as you like, the law remains the same.

"Given the guilty plea, the sentence is harsh as fuck.".

As many posters have stated ( and linked to) she chose to plead guilty knowing the offence she was charged with and the sentencing guidelines for this offence being freely available....

You can disagree as much as you like, the law remains the same.

Here's the law in question - sentencing guidelines. The starting points are not for custodial sentences:
https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/magistrates-court/item/racial-hatred-offences-hatred-against-persons-on-religious-grounds-or-grounds-of-sexual-orientation/

Category 1
Starting point
3 years’ custody

Category 1:

• Offender uses position of trust, authority or influence to stir up hatred
• Intention to incite serious violence
• Persistent activity

So definitely not the first or the third bullet point, in this case. And given the deletion and apology, hard to categorise the offense within the second bullet point.

His Honour Judge Melbourne Inman said:

“You intended to incite serious violence. What you did encouraged activity which threatened or endangered life.”

*His Honour Judge Melbourne Inman said:

“You intended to incite serious violence. What you did encouraged activity which threatened or endangered life.”*

I fail to see how he arrived at that conclusion, and I disagree with it.

This is what I don’t understand - she had no position of trust, influence or authority. There was no evidence of persistent activity and there was no evidence that her tweet had the intention of inciting serious violence given the number and character of her followers. And there was certainly no evidence that it did contribute to the violence.

She pled guilty to it.

@Maitri108 And that was clearly a mistake which I’m guessing was due to poor legal advice.

She had 10000 followers and is reasonably well known in the local (extremely multi cultural) community. Whether that counts as a position of influence I don’t know.

She did persistently post racist tweets though.

She pled guilty to it.

She was extremely poorly advised if she pled guilty to the Category 1 charge specifically.

I know the Free Speech Union has been involving itself in more of these cases, and the outcomes are quite different with decent counsel.

That was good advice as it reduced her sentence.

Her solicitor would have advised her to plead guilty given the evidence, as it reduces her sentence.

The dildo of consequence rarely arrives lubed.

"I fail to see how he arrived at that conclusion, and I disagree with it."

Probably best you are not a judge then!

@WhatWasPromised there is no law against racism as such, it has to be inciting violence. Did she persistently do that?

@Maitri108 a lot of legal minds seem to be of the view that she may have been found not guilty.

Which legal minds?

She called for people to be murdered during a racist riot. She pled guilty to incitement. She was sentenced according to the crime.

@Maitri108 Allison Pearson’s article refers to lawyers being astonished at the advice to plead guilty, the Spectator has written articles saying the same and there are a number of Substacks offering a similar legal opinion.

The Free Speech Union have been advised in a number of cases where people were badly advised to plead guilty.