nice
be careful what you say, becouse if someone with power doesn't like it you're gonna get f---ed.
I'll have to hold off on my blowing up/shooting politico rants now, and the what I'd do if I were a terrorist theories.
A man who allegedly made a joke threat to bomb a UK airport on Twitter has been charged with sending a menacing message. Paul Chambers, 26, of Balby, is scheduled to appear at Doncaster Magistrates' Court on Friday for a preliminary hearing after he was charged by South Yorkshire police on Thursday, The Independent reports. …
Here we have the case of a computer nerd fanbois terrorist being cunningly flushed into the open by the airport authorities pretending that they had the wrong kind of snow, like the Eurostar snow, and cancelling his flight.
With subterfuge like that, he is lucky to be banned from Robin Hood airport
Paris, because that is a much better place to fly
It might seem a bit harsh but he only has himself to blame. Making any kind of bomb threat in this day and age - no matter how light-hearted - will be taken seriously. You have to bear in mind that they cannot hear tone of voice or determine somebody's mood from a message like that, so for all they know he might have been deadly serious.
The Sneaky Beaky computers picked up his words - not people. Does anyone really think that everything we say, write and do now isn't monitored one way or another? Video Voice and text monitoring is out there - for real... after all the UK has more CCTV per head of population than any other country for instance....
Computers are easy to set up to do the monitoring for vocal or written words and phrases that might - just might - be offensive to 'them'...Mostly a good thing IF it is used to catch real terrorists, but the real danger is overdoing it against the general population...
I'd rather we hadn't been put in the situation we (the country) are in but we are where we are and surveillance is the name of the game. just let's not get carried away shall 'we' !!!
"You have to bear in mind that they cannot hear tone of voice or determine somebody's mood from a message like that, so for all they know he might have been deadly serious."
Quite right! I find it very difficult to judge the sincerity of Bin Laden's tweets. Sometimes I think he's just being flat-out sarcastic!
While on the surface it seems a waste of time and money to charge this idiot, hopefully it will serve as a deterrent that other social-networking-tards will take heed of and not post bomb threat "jokes."
If I wrote to him and "joked" that I was going to kill his family, I'm sure he'd be the first to complain...
Rescued from Google's cache, the troublesome Tweet appears to be:
[quote]
pauljchambers Crap! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together, otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky-high!!
4:08 AM Jan 6th from Tweetie
[/quote]
Now, I know you shouldn't make such jokes as you go through airport security, but can you really forbid such comments in all public places ... ?
... Do I then become an accessory to "sending a menacing message"?
If that's the actual text in the tweet, then yes, this is a complete waste of time - it's blindingly obvious it's not a credible threat.
I've just searched twitter for "I'm going to kill" - the police have got their work cut out, the number of potential serial killers on there staggering.
I wanted to suggest that you google for "Crap! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together, otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky-high!!" to confirm the source, but now I am finding that Google is taking forever to return a result for that. But if I parallel google for "foo" then the results come as quick as ever.
Methinks I have triggered some Echelon function.
If I don't post again then assume the black helicopters have got me.
It's not a "bomb hoax". It would be if he called the airport to report a bomb, which didn't exist of course. It might be if he twitted "tell the authorities I'm gonna ......". But this is just a disgruntled client venting, letting off steam. Use this test: would the man in the street be threatened by this. We all know the answer - "not even close".
The magistrate is just as likely to give him a slap for forcing the police to waste their time. They *have* to investigate this crap - they aren't allowed any discretion for terrorist threats. There had to be a prosecution too so all those hours spent didn't go to waste when the coppers are reporting their stats.
He should be cautioned but that only seems to be used for real criminals these days. Personally, I'd make him wear a sandwich board at the airport for a week with "I'm a legally identified idiot - ask me why!" on it.
... they'll find something on his computers that can be regarded as "extreme", and get him that way!
Oh, and for all those saying "Serves him right", we used to have this thing called free speech - you could say anything you like, and without further evidence, it could not be prosecuted (and yes, it did include shouting "Fire" in a crowded theatre). If you don't want people to be free to say what they want to, sod off to China.
He actually threatened to blow up the airport, this is a plain and simple fact, go into a bank and tell the assistant that you have a gun and see what "freedom of speech" does for you, hame some common sense.
He made a big, stupid mistake, but other people have threatened explosions and murders via similar methods and carried out their threats, you must treat the threats equally, Eric Harris had put up threats on his website before the Columbine massacre, if these threats were taken seriously then maybe he wouldn't have killed so many people.
You cannot blame the authorities for over-reacting when undereaction could not only result in loss of life but also the public pointing fingers at them, now if they'd chased him down a tube station and shot him in the face a few times then maybe they should have some criticism, but not for this.
""Free Speech" means you can have an opinion about everything, not you can threaten to kill people."
Let me deal with that for you, so you can apologise later:
1. "Free speech" means "free speech", not "free opinions". There is no point having an opinion if you can't express it, even if it is offensive or frightening to someone. For it to become sanctionable speech, there has to be behaviour to back it up so that it becomes a conceivable threat. If I were to say in this forum "I'm going to kill anyone that disagrees with me about free speech", no-one would take it seriously ... would they?
2. This guy didn't threaten to kill or harm anyone - he made a joke (remember those from when we had a free society) in order to let off some steam about the situation. Yes, he's a pillock - I live near Doncaster Airport, and they were not deliberately trying to keep aeroplanes away - but he has the right to say it as long as he doesn't act on it.
(that you're such a blinkered fool)
1. So your point is "I'm blowing the airport sky high" should be completely ignored unless there's some behaviour to back it up? what like, he's blown things up before? seriously? the man was charged with making a threat using a public network (which is what he did), then they investigated further, this is how these things work (charge if evidence then investigate), will he actually get jail time? nahhhhhh.....
2. No, you can not say anything you like as long as you don't act on it, don't be stupid, go up to a policeman and tell him that you're planning to murder the prime minister within the next 3 months, or post an entry on a public forum how you're going to make a bomb and put it in a shopping mall, just for authenticity post some "plans" give details of your bomb ingredients, then when you get a knock on the door say "I wasn't really doing to do it", do you think the old bill will a. shrug their shoulders and go "OK, sorry to bother you" or do your think they would b. charge you with "sending by public communications network a message that was grossly offensive, or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character contrary to section 127 of the Communications Act 2003" and investigate you?
What has happened here is that he has been CHARGED, he's not been put in chokey for the rest of his life, the police saw that he'd made a threat, the threat met certain criteria, public network, specific and time based, they were duty bound to "'ave a chat" with him, if you're involved in an RTA you will have your rights read, it's just part of the process, personally I'd have just given him a caution, the minimum needed to get the paperwork done.
You also seem quite naïve when you think it's OK to be "frightening", remember you can assault somebody without actually touching them if they have reason to believe that you could hurt them, if I got a shotgun ran up to somebody and told them I was going to shoot them in the face because I hate ginger people I assume you think it's OK as long as I don't actually do it?
The law, is the law, he may not have been aware of the law, but as it stands you commit a crime if you make menacing remarks on a public network.
I can't see 12 honest men and women imagining that he was acting in a threatening way.
Why do many people who cause actual harm get let off with a caution, whereas this guy gets the book thrown at him, despite no reasonable person imagining for one second that he planned to blow anything up, or even to give anyone the impression that he might.
because he did the modern equivalent of publicly claiming to "practice witchcraft". 500 years ago, making a public statement to the effect that you were trafficking with dark powers got you burned at the stake, regardless of your actual innocence or guilt. Today, "terrorist" and "paedophile" have replaced "witch", but the Spanish Inquisition is still alive and kicking.
To quote from S*M*A*S*H's (I Want To) Kill Somebody:
So i'm a hyprocrite
Cos i don't believe in capital punishment
But here's my paradoxical quip
"The people who prescribe to it are
The people who should subscribe to it"
It's not that i want them dead
Its just this world be be a better place
If they never existed
I want to kill somebody
Margaret Thatcher, Jefferey Archer,
Michael Heseltine, John Major, Virginia Bottomley
Especially Gill Shepherd's got an appalling unemployment record
I want to kill somebody
Update with today's control-freak politicans/police chiefs at your leisure.
Jokes about security are sometimes a little funny when you are talking face to face with people who know your sense of humour, but when you know the security forces remit is to be uptight (and we do) then you can only blame yourself when they take you seriously and over react to your "joke".
I am no fan of the police state, but if the police did nothing about the twitterings and then something happened we would castigate them.
If you "joke" about a bouncer's mum/girlfriend then you expect to get hit right?
"I am no fan of the police state, but if the police did nothing about the twitterings and then something happened we would castigate them."
Well I'm sure the papers would pillory them.
But I don't think it is a good justification for the police to jump on anyone that says something that they don't like the sound of. There must be thousands of incidents a week of people saying things like "I'm gonna kill you for this", many of them in public: should they all be hauled before the beak because he threatened someone with murder?
If you said something unpleasant about a bouncer's girlfriend, sure he would wallop you, but he would still be guilty of assault and rightly so. We should expect a higher standard from our police than from a bouncer.
"As reported in the Doncaster Free Press."
--
And what's with all the love of censorship and the acceptance of this kind of insane officialdom pomposity? Quick assessment: do people blow up airports due to snow-closures or as revenge for poor administration or is this hyperbole? Do serious bombers offer to cancel their mass-murder plans if the snow is cleared from the runway in time for their holidays?
A random twitter about getting the airport open is not the same as sending a letter to the airport saying you're you've put a bomb somewhere in the building because the local mullah told you that all westerners must die. It isn't a hoax - he isn't pretending he's going to do it, its hyperbole!
Just because officials have been making fools of themselves in the recent past by exaggerating any an all threats and handing out out-of-proportion punishments is no reason to allow them to go on doing so. They need reigning in and reprimanding for wasting public funds and paying attention to twitter.
The only thing worse than the stupidity of the officials involved in this actions is the stupidity of supporting them in their stupid ways!
... but not remotely as big an idiot as the people on his case.
A measured response would have been to interview and warn the guy about his stupid behaviour. Any normal seasoned adult (as opposed to barely pubescent police officers and security jobsworths) should have been able to assess the risk there and then.
The jobsworths are taking over this entire country...
While this may have warranted a knock on his door from a couple of uniforms, and maybe a trip to the station for a stern warning / caution, this is just rediculous.
The police / CPS aren't doing themselves any favours with cases like this, while they seem desperate to be seen to be 'doing something', their modus oparandi appears to be to jump on the first case they can find and 'make and example' which just makes them look like stupid facist wankers.
I'd like to bet there was a high level call to GCHQ that went something like this...
"With this underpants bomb attempt we need to make a splash - up the fear level and bash people into line... How about we find something for you to prosecute, not too high level but enough to stir up the press? Sounds good, what do you have in mind..? Give us a few hours, we capture hundreds of snippets every day that could be prosecuted under the TA, we'll monitor the social networks for a few hours and draw up a short list of potentials, then you can take your pick..."
Paranoid? Me? Who sent you?!
What a waste of money, time and effort. Who ever is involved in propelling this case forward should be fired, along with their managers. If ANY public money has been spent on this it should be reclaimed from the idiots involved, their pensions should be claimed back, hell they should be sued for incompetence. Stupid idiots.
Can we please stop employing idiots with public money.
Communications Act 2003: Section 127 covers all forms of public communications, and subsection (1) defines an offence of sending a 'grossly offensive...obscene, indecent or menacing' communication3. Subsection (2) defines a separate offence where, for the purposes of causing annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety, a person sends a message which that person knows to be false (or causes it to be sent), or persistently makes use of a public communications system4.
So, basically, all I have to do is say something annoying in a public communications system, and for one of you lot to complain to the plod, and I'd be arrested...
"Yo mama's got IBS, her farts causes climate change..."
I've got my coat on already...
In a sane world, the cops would probably do some quick background checks, some investigation and -perhaps - a personal interview with the suspect, costing their taxpayers a few dozen €.
In the real world this poor guy probably had his home assaulted by dozens of heavily armed cops wearing black masks, had his pet dog -a chihuahua- killed by the cops due to the risk it posed to the operatives, and was raped with a baton just in case he was hiding explosives in his rectum.
I agree this is thousands of times more expensive , but it's a lot funnier. :)
Paris, cos Paris owns a chihuahua, why else?
Yes, twit for the comment but where are we going here?
If he was John Terry, he'd have been able to get a super-injunction.
I agree on the jury thing. Demand it - because it would really be a FFS moment after being sworn in....
Sink the Island! (Here's hoping El Reg won't dob me in!!)
There should be some list of things forbidden to say to make it easy to censor ourselves, don't you think? If ever "planting figs" would be used as synonym to planting an IED, we should know before telling someone that we are going to plant figs all around here...
Big Brother, because the list should be maintained by Ministry of Love.
I don't understand all the support for this idiot. According to what has been quoted above
[quote]
pauljchambers Crap! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together, otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky-high!!
[/quote]
He gave an ultimatum and made a direct threat. There is not any humour in that at all.
Today a bloke flew his plane into the tax offices in Austin, Texas. It has been reported that he posted a manifesto and suicide note on the web. If the authorities had been alerted what were they to think, "Oh, he's just some harmless jerk with completely normal feelings towards the IRS"?
Other postal types have made specific threats on the web and carried them out.
I'm sure that a lot of people just want to vent their anger but there is no way of filtering these out from the serious ones even if it is deliberately dressed up as humour. What is so innocent about this particular threat?
1. Think about this - if the threat had been real all of this post would never have happened because under the existing UK terrorism laws he would have just disappeared into custody and the first 'we' would have known is when he was jailed and possibly not even then....
2. doesn't this say a lot more about how the UK populace's freedoms have been eroded to the point that any emotional outburst of a similar nature could get you locked up! Since 1998, when UK people had total freedom of speech and were innocent until proven guilty, we have gone to a point were we are treated as guilty until proven innocent!
3. What he did was stupid but not malicious, by all means give him a hard time and put him on the watch list (Pretty big by now?), but put him in front of the Judge? Really? One can take things too seriously you know
(where's my passport :-( )
As has been pointed out in other comments, freedom of speech, if it exists, is the right to express an opinion.
Making threats to kill or maim has been an offence for as long as I can remember. Not 100% sure but I also think making threats or plotting to commit any kind of criminal activity is an offence.
1. Perhaps the title of the article should have been "Twat[ter] made example of"
2. He's been charged with sending a menacing message, which from what I can see, he did, in fact send a menacing message (he hasn't been found guilty of anything).
3. If he gets put up in front of the beak, and the CPS will decide if this happens, and if he gets anything more than dischaged and bound then yes it's an over reaction.
But, remember there is a huge difference in the concequences of what you say depending where and when you say it, if he verbally said this to a mate, then nothing would happen, but he didn't he publically posted the threat, this is the key, this is his epic fail, freedom of speech doesn't protect you from slander, libel or threats, do you think that he would have got a ban and been charged if he wrote "You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together or I'm going to organise a public demonstration".
A friend of mine got an injunction against her ex because he sent a text saying something like "if you know what's good for you, you'll come back", is this fair on him? should he have the benefit of the doubt because he claimed he was joking? did they over-react? this story ended very badly, they didn't over-react.
Individuals will always suffer if it appears to protect society as a whole.
'do you think that he would have got a ban and been charged if he wrote "You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together or I'm going to organise a public demonstration"'
Given the current government who don't like that sort of thing, yes.
"But, remember there is a huge difference in the concequences of what you say depending where and when you say it"
I hope that when you speak that you're *very* careful anyone around you doesn't have a mobile phone, camera, recording device - or that CCTV cameras are trained on someone else and is lacking in audio.
As has already been pointed out - twitter "I'm going to kill", "I'm going to rape", "I'm going to mug", "I'm going to rob", "I'm going to be an Member of Parliament" ... that's thought crime right there - this is total and utter nonsense, lacks any credibility and makes security intelligence ever more an oxymoron.
... "If the authorities had been alerted what were they to think, "Oh, he's just some harmless jerk with completely normal feelings towards the IRS"?" ... yes, they should - that is part of the risk of life. If a person with no previous background makes angry comments, it has to be regarded as a continuation of the status quo - i.e. that he is going to continue having no background. Most people never do anything to back up an outburst (partly because the outburst makes them feel better).
It is part of the risk of living in a free society that someone will change their usual behaviour and do something odd. That has to be accepted if we are to be free.
...tend not to have their computer equipment removed and forensically examined in private to see if the account was hacked.
He had no means to follow through on the 'threat', the 'threat' was made to the world at large rather than being specific and it wasn't a real threat.
If he had said "I'll blow up the world" would we be having this discussion? He has as much chance of doing one as the other.
The real question is not: is this guy a tit? Yes of course he is. But I expect he's learned a valuable lesson already.
The important question is: what benefit is there in prosecuting him? Is society protected any better because of the retribution that is being meted out here, or is some officious plod-squirt just getting his jollies off on 'punishing' an easy target?
Given my natural bias against the filth and their corrupt practices, I'm afraid I go with the latter. Once you give the educationally disadvantaged a uniform, a nightstick and carte blanche to harass anyone who speaks out of turn, they just turn out to be a bunch of c*nts!
The guy's a prize Muppet, no doubt, but FFS - some speccy tit chatting shit on Twitter is hardly an al Qaeda sleeper cell.
I liked the sandwich board and stocks ideas as suitable punishments. Let's face it, he is a bloody silly bastard, but he's no terrorist.
Punish him for wasting police time, but not for terrorism.