Up in court (First Offence)

[1960darrenh]

Police found two jokes that I had posted on Facebook that they considered racist. I was asked to go voluntarily to the station for an interview. Two weeks later I have received a summon to court.

This is my first time in court and have never been in trouble before.

Does anyone know the likely hood of this case. Remember, it was 2 jokes that were posted on my supposedly private profile on Facebook.

Am I looking at prison? Fine? ASBO, Community Service??

Also if I am found guilty, I could lose my job as I am a taxi driver and the charge will show on my Criminal Records Bureau

My court date is 5th September 2012

[ojread2]

I feel for you
Genuinely
There is a FB page that tells Dead Baby Jokes and it's still up and running despite 100's if not 1000's of reports

I can't help you any further than that I'm afraid but, although I totally disagree with racism, I hope you get community service or less

Next we'll be banned from living

[EDDIE51]

DEFINATELY NOT prison ! I will be astounded if this gets as far as court.
what happened at the police station? I would have just apologised and said it would not happen again, I would have expected that to be the end of it.
The problem is that as a taxi driver you will lose your job ! a taxi firm could not continue to employ a driver who had been convicted of a ' racist crime'
I realise you can not tell the jokes here but just how bad were they ? I just can't see that the police got involved unless the jokes were really offensive

[invisiblelady]

Is this true? Are private accounts really being trawled through by Police? What has happened to freedom of speech? Particularly in private?

[Jennykenny]

So you feel that it is okay to be racist in private. You should be ashamed of yourself. Having said that I don't think you should go to prison. Perhaps some community service working with mixed groups of people who need help might open your mind to the fact that we are all equal, and that we have a right to be protected from abuse under the law.

[invisiblelady]

No. I didn't say that at all Jennykenny. I was merely asking if Police are now trawling private accounts to see if anything is being said there that they don't agree with.

[Jennykenny]

Sorry my comment wasn't directed at you, Invisiblelady, but at the original poster.

[EDDIE51]

NOTHING on facebook is private no matter what settings you use. The police can look at anything on it , otherwise how could they check for abusive , pornographic , racist or other illegal posts?
Will people EVER learn that FB is not a secure site and never will be ? it was not designed to be secure and no matter what they do nothing will change that as the fault is in the basic design of the site.Someone with good knowledge of computer security can get into anything on face book within an hour or so at most.

[bazwillrun]

"So you feel that it is okay to be racist in private. You should be ashamed of yourself."

get over yourself, people can and should be able to do whatever they want in private without people like you acting so self righteous and indignant
truly pathetic.

I suppose you also want to control peoples thoughts as well

[EDDIE51]

This is a duplicated post, the other one is titled 'Summons to court' but is identical.

[invisiblelady]

Fair enough JennyKenny :-)
I DO realise that nothing is private on FB and can indeed be looked at if necessary by the Police, but surely they look at people's accounts for specific reasons and not just generally? (P.S....I don't say anything controversial on my account, mainly because I'm not a controversial type person!) However, I again ask, what happened to freedom on speech and who will decide what can and can't be said? (and I'm not referring to obvious things like racism, but other topics that may be discussed where people have opposite opinions?)

[1960darrenh]

At the police station, I was just interviewed and a tape recording, the told to go. I explained that the jokes were just jokes and that no one other than my friends should have been able to see them. That was my fault for not checking. I have since deleted them. Facebook never got involved either so they were not concerned. I am on 2 charges and both are the same.

On 2/7/12 I displayed some writing, sign or other visible representation which was threatening, abusive or insulting within the hearing or sight of a person likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress, thereby, and the offence was racially aggravated within the terms of Section 28 of the Crime & Disorder Act 1998

Contary to section 31 (1) (c) and (5) of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998

[Duncer]

Just as well serious crimes are so low????

If only.

[VHG]

>>>Perhaps some community service working with mixed groups of people who need help might open your mind to the fact that we are all equal

What an unbelievably naive statement.

Different races and religions behave differently and there are things one group of people might do, such as a so called "honour killing" of your own daughter that we had last week, that others would not dream of doing.

[JonnyBoy12]

Is this a spoof or is this for real? I am not sure what to make of this posting!

[DaisyNonna]

So the police have nothing better to do than trawl facebook?

[Canary42]

I don't believe it.

[lozzer50]

why would police feel the need to trawl facebook hmm

[1960darrenh]

Freedom of speech is a distant memory I'm afraid. The police told me that a member of the public had reported me. When I got to the station, they confirmed that a police officer had viewed the jokes and reported me for them. I asked how they had got access to my Facebook as it was set to private.........NO ANSWER!

[jake-the-peg]

Did these "jokes" involve any specific people - footballers perhaps?

I've seen this

http://sports.myjoyon...news/201206/89056.php

Which looks like it might be relevant to what we're talking about here