14.02.20 Live updates on Harry and Kate’s cases HERE

[MrsSnippyPants]

I shall be glued to social media this morning and thought it might be useful to have a place where we can post updates as they come in so people need to follow just one thread.
Please post Twitter handles of anyone providing live updates as you find them.
@WeAreFairCop are saying it is likely the judgement will NOT be read out so they hope to get a copy and summarise and tweet after 10.30am

@R0wantrees - I haven't seen you post in ages! Welcome back. You've been missed.

Prosecution was brought under the Malicious Communications Act.

I thought Kate Scottow was prosecuted under the Communications Act 2003, section 127.

One of the other things was that Harry said the College of policing was a private company. Is it only me that finds that strange? Is it normal?

I suppose it can't be anything else, but to give a private company such power seems very, very dangerous.

Sadly its become very normal in the public to outsource whether in prisons, education, health, social care & here too, policing.

In every sector there have been serious implications.
Not least when lobby groups have been brought in to advise on policy under the guise of being 'experts'

Harry retweeted the limerick. Who was the person who tweeted it initially for him to retweet it - and what happened to this person? Were they hauled up by police for hate speech or was it just Harry?

I don't know who originally tweeted the limerick (poem!) but there are a few possibilities.

1. they are not in the UK
2. they are in the UK, but police can't identify them.
3. a complaint was only made about Harry the Owl, because he was easily identifiable on twitter as a real UK person.
4. the original tweeter has had a NCHC recorded agains them, but not publicised it.

When Susie Mermads went after Posie, she reported 3 twitterers to the police. The police contacted twitter for their details - and only Posie was in the UK, the other two were in the US, where UK police have no jurisdiction obvs.

Plus say what you like about America - but they have a damn fine respect for freedom of speech.

I suppose it can't be anything else, but to give a private company such power seems very, very dangerous.

As an aside, the majority of CPD training for teachers is delivered by private companies now.

So was the woman who wrote the poem reported to the police?

The woman who wrote the poem is in the UK and easily identifiable.

Mrs B seems aptly named. The statement from this person... Wow... Outer margins of rationality is putting it very politely. Batshit crazy more like.... 😂

I don't know karen - perhaps she wasn't reported, or perhaps she is also one of the 87,000 non crime hate incidents recorded in the past 5 years...

Would those be classed as lawful but still hate incidents? It’s really hard to understand.

Yes. Look at what the College of Policing said today:

What is a hate incident?

A hate incident is any incident which the victim, or anyone else, thinks is based on someone's prejudice towards them because of their race, religion, sexual orientation, disability or because they are transgender.

It is purely about the perception of the victim or anyone else, recording is automatic, and there does not need to be any assessment of the nature of the incident and whether there was actually any hate.

If you listened to the reporting on the BBC today, you'd be left with the impression that Miller went to court because he had been accused of being transphobic and he wanted the Police to be told off. It's much broader than that.

The only women who have recourse to hate crime laws on the basis of 'being a woman', are the 'women' who are actually male.In fact, when you think about it, there is a two tier level of justice available to women

That is a really interesting point. One of the things that I think is central to the judgement is the judge has explicitly acknowledged; citing evidence from Kathleen Stock; this this is a 'multi faceted debate ' in which one side is particularly predisposed to making spurious accusations of hatred without any justification. The conflict between this acknowledgement and the existing hate crime legislation is clear. Why should the onus be on citizens to challenge spurious accusations of hatred which result in non crime incidents? There is an ability to use this legislation for political purposes The judge references this. It will be interesting to see what happens in the appeal. But given the provenance of this in the wake of the Macpherson report, it seems very unlikely it will be repealed.

It's the word hate. They could change it to be something less contentious, I suppose. something which would not require any evidence of hate. Worry incident?

Given what the judge said in Kate's case, I vote for an unkindness incident.

That definition of hate crime is a direct result of the McPherson Report.

Why is MrsB being recorded as the “victim” rather than complainant (in the police records)? Is it actually possible to be a victim of an offence (not that this actually was one) against somebody else, just because you decided to be offended by it?

Thanks @nauticant and the other poster who linked info. This makes no sense at all. If the judge has ruled that there was no hate then how are Humberside allowed to keep that non crime on record? Surely if there is no evidence of hate it's not a hate incident. Gah! this is all ridiculous.

It's the word hate. They could change it to be something less contentious, I suppose. something which would not require any evidence of hate. Worry incident?

Given what the judge said in Kate's case, I vote for an unkindness incident.

I vote for 'searching the internet for something to be offended by' incident

I don't think any speculation to the identity of an anonymous person is helpful.

I think B is normally not linked to the name. Like Child A in the OCC case is unlikely to have a name starting A

In R v Shayler [2003] 1 AC 247, [21], Lord Bingham emphasised the connection between freedom of expression and democracy. He observed that ‘the fundamental right of free expression has been recognised at common law for very many years’ and explained:

^“The reasons why the right to free expression is regarded as fundamental are familiar, but merit brief restatement in the present context. Modern democratic
government means government of the people by the people for the people. But there can be no government by the people if they are ignorant of the issues to be
resolved, the arguments for and against different solutions and the facts underlying those arguments. The business of government is not an activity about which
only those professionally engaged are entitled to receive information and express opinions. It is, or should be, a participatory process. But there can be no assurance that government is carried out for the people unless the facts are made known, the issues publicly ventilated …”.^

Can someone send that on a memo to Starmer, Long-Bailey, Thornberry and Nandy and Cc the entire labour leadership please?

Ta.

Why is MrsB being recorded as the “victim” rather than complainant (in the police records)? Is it actually possible to be a victim of an offence (not that this actually was one) against somebody else, just because you decided to be offended by it?

Under current hate crime laws, yes. You could yell "piss off you disabled cow" at me and I might not find that hateful, but if a complete stranger (the "anyone else" cited in the description above) passing by thought it was hate speech and reported it as such, they would be recorded as the victim even though the words were not directed at them, simply by dint of them being the one to consider it hateful/prejudiced.

Gah! this is all ridiculous.

🤣 I feel ya.

It's such a waste of time and money and mental effort. When everyone knows! Everyone fucking knows.

Sweet Jesus...

Why is MrsB being recorded as the “victim” rather than complainant

Because the police immediately accepted, without any independent analysis of the relevant tweets, Mrs B's claims that they were offensive and that they had caused her distress. The use of 'victim' in this context was criticised by the judge who made the point Mrs B had voluntarily chosen to read the tweets

Has Harry been awarded costs?