Felony Facebook posting
The BBC reports a second arrest in connection with the Finsbury Park terror attack.
A man has been arrested on suspicion of posting an offensive Facebook post about the London Finsbury Park attack.
Police said a 37-year-old, believed to be the son of an owner of the Rhondda Cynon Taff company whose van was used in Monday’s attack, is in custody.
Richard Evans allegedly posted: “It’s a shame they don’t hire out steam rollers or tanks could have done a tidy job then.”
Oy.
That’s a disgusting thing to say, and it should have been (and probably was) reported to Facebook, and Facebook should have removed it promptly and perhaps suspended the poster. But arrested?
It’s straightforwardly a crime in the UK to post “an offensive Facebook post”?
I post arguably “offensive” Facebook posts multiple times every day. There are whole large busy Facebook groups that post nothing but unquestionably offensive – and sexist, racist, homophobic, xenophobic etc – commentary and images. I wonder if the London police have found all the offensive posts about Finsbury Park, and considered charging all the perps.
No, I don’t really, because I’m confident they have far more urgent things to do. But then why this?
The relevant law refers to ” insulting written material … that is likely to stir up racial hatred.”. Not to offensive material in general.
This one was widely shared. It was disowned by his father, and by his employer. I’m guessing failure to act was seen as causing more problems. Other FB/Twitter posts have led to prosecution, not always sensibly. The issue here isn’t, in legal terms, offence, but incitement to violence (AFAIK). The Beeb, not for the first time, are being a bit sloppy here
It’s only very remotely incitement to violence though. It’s not “next time hire a tank” but a more indirect “tanks would do a better job.” Obviously it hints at incitement, and that’s why I think FB has a responsibility to take it down promptly, but arresting the guy is a massive other level.
Imagine all the mass shooters that could’ve been stopped…
#1
The relevant law refers to ” insulting written material … that is likely to stir up racial hatred.”. Not to offensive material in general.
What Richard Evans said does not stir up any racial hatred. Not to me. I suspect that if it did the person who would be stirred up would be have other significant problems.
The law is often applied in a deeply worrying way, as in this case, which smacks of being seen to “do” something in the wake of an attack. It falls right in line with our government’s approach to such things, though. For example, the Queen’s speech yesterday mentioned that companies should have incentives to remove hate speech from its services. This would be admirable if there were also incentives for them to protect free speech.
I wonder if Evans’ comment would have resulted in his arrest had he not been the son of the van hire company’s owner?
AoS:
Well yeah, that’s another thing we have to worry about, especially under this government. Policing by data mining is going to become the norm.