Two individuals who posted abusive and threatening tweets to the Twitter account of feminist campaigner Caroline Criado-Perez, were last week jailed at Westminster magistrates' court for their actions.

Isabella Sorley and John Nimmo were jailed for twelve weeks and eight weeks respectively, after they previously pled guilty to sending messages of a menacing character by a public electronic communications network, contrary to the Communications Act 2003. They were further each ordered to pay £800 compensation. However under s127 of the act, the sending by means of a public electronic communications network of a message or other matter which is offensive, indecent, obscene or menacing could result in up to 6 months imprisonment or a fine of up to £5000.

Criado-Perez was subjected to the abusive tweets following her successful campaign to have Jane Austen appear on the new £10 notes, thus maintaining a female presence on bank notes. The tweets included posts from Ms Sorley instructing Criado-Perez to "die you worthless piece of crap", and posts from Mr Nimmo threatening rape and further stating "I will find you".

Judge Howard Riddle stated at the time of sentencing that it was "hard to imagine more extreme threats" and that the intended threatened harm against Criado-Perez "must have been intended to be very high". He further noted that "the fact that they were anonymous heightened the fear. The victims had no way of knowing how dangerous the people making the threats were, whether they had just come out of prison, or how to recognise and avoid them if they came across them in public."

Following the sentencing Criado-Perez posted on Twitter that she felt "immensely relieved that the judge clearly has understood the severity of the impact this abuse has had on me." She intends to donate the damages received to charity.

Stating mitigating factors in court, Nimmo attempted to minimise his actions on the basis that he was not alone in sending the abusive messages. Sorley's lawyer stated that his client was "a victim of a lack of understanding of what this new technology can do and how powerful it is." However clearly there is no such thing as safety in numbers when it comes to social-networking and the power of such sites should not be underestimated...

© MacRoberts 2014

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