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4 months for "Trolling"

Darat said:
The oldest reference to such legislation is from "...the 1930s legislation covering misuse of telephones..." so as I said for decades. One of the main issues the article has is with the use of the phrase "..public electronic communications network.." and I strongly disagree with them on that. The change of wording seems to me to be very much in the spirit of the older legislation, if such a change hadn't been made I would suspect that it could be argued that telephone calls that used the internet in part of the network would no longer have been covered by the legislation.

Of course that doesn't mean that it is right or wrong to have such legislation it just provides the historical background to the discussion.
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I agree that the 127 act is intended to update the 30's legislation to apply to electronic communications. Another concern is the number of convictions that are being obtained under 127 where previously they'd have been sought under the Serious Crimes Act 2007 (as in the cases of the two men gaoled for 4 years for incitement to riot).
 
Skepticemea said:
I agree that the 127 act is intended to update the 30's legislation to apply to electronic communications. Another concern is the number of convictions that are being obtained under 127 where previously they'd have been sought under the Serious Crimes Act 2007 (as in the cases of the two men gaoled for 4 years for incitement to riot).
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Are there statistics for this?
 
Skepticemea said:
Considering the number of people that appear to actively seek offence (and the internet is certainly a target rich environment for that) I consider this piece of legislation to be pretty dangerous. Did Chambers get leave to appeal to the High Court?
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There is an appeal process ongoing I believe, but it hasn't been heard yet.

ETA: 10 Nov 2011
 
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Darat said:
Are there statistics for this?
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Not sure, but before I indulge in any further hyperbole, the Paul Chambers case, referred to as the Twitter "Bomb Hoax" case, would also be covered by the Criminal Law Act 1977. So, although the Tweet that Chambers was arrested for was a "bomb hoax", he wasn't convicted for perpetrating a "bomb hoax".

This article puts it better than I could:

http://www.thelawyer.com/the-twitter-%E2%80%9Cbomb-hoax%E2%80%9D-case-worse-than-we-thought?/1003651.article

This thread is straying somewhat from the OP, however, I suppose my discomfort with this article of law is that it is, like the Terrorism Act 2006 , being used as a catch-all to convict people of offences that exisiting legislation exists to enable prosecution but where the onus of providing a body of evidence is too taxing for the CPS.
 
Skepticemea said:
Not sure, but before I indulge in any further hyperbole, the Paul Chambers case, referred to as the Twitter "Bomb Hoax" case, would also be covered by the Criminal Law Act 1977. So, although the Tweet that Chambers was arrested for was a "bomb hoax", he wasn't convicted for perpetrating a "bomb hoax".

This article puts it better than I could:

http://www.thelawyer.com/the-twitter-%E2%80%9Cbomb-hoax%E2%80%9D-case-worse-than-we-thought?/1003651.article

This thread is straying somewhat from the OP, however, I suppose my discomfort with this article of law is that it is, like the Terrorism Act 2006 , being used as a catch-all to convict people of offences that exisiting legislation exists to enable prosecution but where the onus of providing a body of evidence is too taxing for the CPS.
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As you say perhaps a trifle wide diversion for this thread but I do share your perception, that was why I was wondering if there are actual statistics we can look at as I'm all too aware that perception does not always match up with the reality.

ETA: There is another thing to keep in mind because of how the law works in the UK. Until we've got actual cases convicted (and all the appeals out of the way) we won't really know how the legislation will be interpreted by the courts, we could find that a court decides to throw out a case because that's not what the law was meant to cover. I've mentioned this before in regards to all the legislative changes made by the last lot in regards to anti-discrimination laws - it can take years before it all settles down.
 
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Darat said:
I'm probably about to display my ignorance of areas of the UK - but is there a "Reading" in the Grampian area?
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I wasn't aware that there was a "Grampian" in the Reading area, or that you had reorganised your legal system to incorporate the post of Procurator Fiscal.
 
Auntie Beeb said:
Grampian Police said a 25-year-old man - who BBC Scotland understands to be Sean Duffy, from the Reading area - had been charged.
A report will be submitted to the procurator fiscal.
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There you go.

Are we talking about seperate things?


ETA: The original Reading one is on Radio 2's Jeremy Vine show right now. The father is talking about the graphic nature of the images and the considerable distress they caused family & friends.
 
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If you would like to argue that a law prevents someone from expressing real thoughts or ideas, you should try to find a case where that has happened. If you can. An abusive idiot getting a few weeks for harassment is only a threat to a free country in a philosophy class, not in the real world. In this case the law is not even new, so the slippery slope argument seems to be disproved by time.
 
Architect said:
There you go.
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From the BBC site: "14 September 2011 Last updated at 12:30" The article has changed since you posted it.

You seem to have taken umbrage over me asking whether there was an area/place called "Reading" in the area that Grampian police cover. The question seemed a quite natural one to ask since this thread starts with a link about a "Reading men", so I didn't know whether the coincidence was just in the name of two different places or the two of them were from the same place.
 
Jensen said:
If you would like to argue that a law prevents someone from expressing real thoughts or ideas, you should try to find a case where that has happened. If you can. An abusive idiot getting a few weeks for harassment is only a threat to a free country in a philosophy class, not in the real world. In this case the law is not even new, so the slippery slope argument seems to be disproved by time.
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I would shed not a single tear if that bloke was punched in the face at breakfast, lunch and dinner for each and every day of his sentence. What I am concerned about is that this law is being not being utilised just to punish people for offensive posts on the internet (for which we all should be concerned about considering there appears to be no burden of proof for what's considered offensive other than what the CPS thinks it is) but that that an increasing number of criminal suits are being brought using this article to prosecute where the offence firmly sits under another statute.
 
Skepticemea said:
I would shed not a single tear if that bloke was punched in the face at breakfast, lunch and dinner for each and every day of his sentence. What I am concerned about is that this law is being not being utilised just to punish people for offensive posts on the internet (for which we all should be concerned about considering there appears to be no burden of proof for what's considered offensive other than what the CPS thinks it is) but that that an increasing number of criminal suits are being brought using this article to prosecute where the offence firmly sits under another statute.
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It's the court that makes the judgement regarding that not the CPS, from the first of the articles you linked to "...The sole arbiter of whether the message or other material is of an grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character is the Court, applying an "ordinary person" test..."
 
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Free speech be damned - if a society has principles that leave it unable to deal appropriately with people whose actions are intended to cause distress to others for their own amusement and succeed in their aim (in this case it was clear that severe damage up to and including inducement to suicide was caused), it’s time to examine those principles.

Arguing against this is somewhat like that libertarian guy who claimed he’d protest against raising taxes to protect the Earth from an extinction-level asteroid strike. It’s not proof of ideological purity, just a clear mapping of the boundary at which any given dogma inevitably gives way to the practical ethics-on-the-ground.

And as for the Aspergers (assuming it’s not of the imaginary self-diagnosed type) - if I had a disability that somehow prevented me from not punching people in the face it wouldn’t be unreasonable to put some caveats around my ability to go outside, nor would I have any argument against being imprisoned for GBH if I kept deliberately putting myself in punch-friendly situations.
 
Darat said:
From the BBC site: "14 September 2011 Last updated at 12:30" The article has changed since you posted it.

You seem to have taken umbrage over me asking whether there was an area/place called "Reading" in the area that Grampian police cover. The question seemed a quite natural one to ask since this thread starts with a link about a "Reading men", so I didn't know whether the coincidence was just in the name of two different places or the two of them were from the same place.
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Presumably Grampian police were waiting for the outcome of yesterday's case, or it just couldn't be reported.
 
Matt the Poet said:
Free speech be damned - if a society has principles that leave it unable to deal appropriately with people whose actions are intended to cause distress to others for their own amusement and succeed in their aim (in this case it was clear that severe damage up to and including inducement to suicide was caused), it’s time to examine those principles.
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You may want to reread the article a bit more closely. As I stated earlier, I made the same mistake on my first read through.

This guys pattern is to find memorial sites and defame the deceased. based on this, I don't think his posts had anything to do with the suicides unless he also happens to own a TARDIS.
 
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