Stephen Fry, a comedy legend in the United Kingdom, says he will personally pay the £3,600 fine levied on Paul Chambers, who joked about blowing up a British airport on micro blogging site, Twitter.
Twitter 'Airport Joke'
Chambers, 26, was convicted after he showed his frustration about flight cancellations and snow-related delays at Robin Hood Airport, Doncaster, by Tweeting: ““****! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week and a bit to get your **** together otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky high! ”
Chambers appealed against the sentence but the conviction was upheld by Judge Jacqueline Davies who felt that anyone reading the tweet would regard it as “menacing.”
Stephen Fry is one of the U.K.’s most popular Twitter users with almost 2 million followers. After the court case appeal in November 2010, Mr Fry tweeted the message: “Whatever they fine you, I’ll pay it.”
Freedom of Speech
The court case has been met with outrage by concerned freedom of speech and civil liberties campaigners.
Padraig Reidy of the U.K.-based Index on Censorship, said: “Prosecutors seem to have completely ignored the notion of context. If he genuinely intended to blow up the airport he wouldn't have tweeted it.”
Chambers is now considering taking up the case with his Member of Parliament.
South Yorkshire Police, which originally brought the prosecution after an airport security manager spotted the comment five days after the tweet, says the “matter is closed.”
Twitter Trouble
Other Twitters users who have got into trouble for their tweets, include:
- Kerry McCarthy, Labour Member of Parliament for Bristol East, who was cautioned by police for revealing the result of local postal votes before the end of polling at the U.K. general election in May 2010.
- Dallas Mavericks Owner, Mark Cuban, who was fined $25,000 by the National Basketball Association for complaining about the referees in a Mavericks-Denver Nuggets game in a frustrated tweet.
- Actress Lindsay Lohan, who criticized her former partner Samantha Ronson on Twitter, making a string of accusations against her in a series of rants.
- American actor Ashton Kutcher posted a picture of wife Demi Moore’s bottom on Twitter, as she bent over in a bikini. Demi was not impressed.
- U.K. Conservative councilor Gareth Compton, who has been arrested by police for tweeting that libertarian journalist Jasmin Alibhai-Brown should be “stoned to death.” Compton has been suspended by the Conservative Party. He has been released on police bail.
Sources:
Daily Telegraph: Stephen Fry Offers to Pay Fine in Twitter Joke Trial
Adrian Grahams - Adrian currently writes for several online and offline publications and specializes in communications, technology, business, media, ...
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