Media coverage of Fair Cop and the Judicial Review

• Officers in Bedfordshire recorded the incident as a non-crime hate incident
• Few other details about the ‘crime’ are known but it will remain on file for years
• Campaigners call for the ‘Orwellian’ police guidelines for hate to be scrapped

‘The police have completely lost the plot,’ said Harry Miller, a former police officer from pressure group Fair Cop.

‘How the hell can whistling Bob The Builder at someone land you with a criminal record?’

Read article: Man gets ‘racial hatred’ police record – for whistling the Bob The Builder theme tune | Daily Mail Online

Police forces have been threatened with legal action over their links to Stonewall, amid concerns the controversial charity’s transgender training is impacting their impartiality.

Campaigners [Harry Miller of Fair Cop] have written to chief constables warning they will begin legal proceedings against any force that remains part of the Stonewall Diversity Champions scheme beyond a “period of consideration”.

Priti Patel is to stop police from recording so-called hate incidents that are not crimes over fears that the policy is blighting employment prospects and curbing free speech.

Government sources confirmed that the home secretary has told the College of Policing to drop guidance to forces that those accused of non-criminal incidents should have them recorded on police files.

Read article: Priti Patel orders police to stop recording hate incidents that are not crimes | News | The Times

People accused of hate incidents that are not crimes should have the allegation wiped from their record, Priti Patel will tell police chiefs as she launches a review into the policy.

The Home Secretary has asked the College of Policing to carry out a review into “non-crime hate incidents” which can blight people’s careers years after they occur, The Telegraph can disclose.

Read article: Wipe non-crime hate allegations, says Priti Patel

Allegations of hate speech made against 120,000 people have been logged by police, prompting criticism that they have diverted attention from forces tackling other priorities, such as violent crime.

Campaigners added that logging “non-crime hate incidents”, even after police had decided that what had been said or posted online had broken no laws, had a “chilling effect” on free speech.

In response to a Freedom of Information (FoI) request, none of the 43 police forces in England and Wales could cite any crime that had been prevented and 20 said that they did not have a system to monitor the effectiveness of recording the claims.

Read article: Hate speech records are having ‘chilling effect’ on free speech

• Police cannot identify a single crime that has been prevented by recording hate-speech allegations
• Critics say controversial practice of logging ‘non-crime hate incidents’ has a ‘chilling effect on free speech’
• Senior officers insist it helps them ‘prevent serious hostility and violence’

Police have recorded hate-speech allegations against more than 120,000 people – yet cannot identify a single crime that has been prevented by the exercise.

Critics say the controversial practice of logging ‘non-crime hate incidents’, even after officers decided what was said or posted online did not break any laws, has a ‘chilling effect on free speech’.

Read article: Police log 120,000 ‘hate reports’ – but not ONE is a crime – as top cops defend system

Hatred is the worst of all human emotions. It destroys relationships, causes chaos and destruction to others; saddest of all, it hurts the hater just as much as the object of their animosity.

Gandhi had a good line about anger, hatred’s close cousin, which applies just as well: holding onto these emotions is like taking poison and expecting the other person to die.

Read the article: Should the Government be policing hate?

When the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 it took with it the East German State security force known as the ‘Stasi’. At the time of its demise, the Stasi employed 91,015 people and relied on 173,081 informants. This works out as one secret police officer for every 166 East Germans, making the Gestapo look like lazy amateurs with their trifling one per 2,000. The Stasi were dangerous because of their embrace of ‘Zersetzung’  (‘decomposition’ or ‘biodegradation’). The aim of ‘Zersetzung’ was to destroy the psychological integrity of an individual, by gathering information to damage their reputation and their personal relationships.

Read article: The British Twitter Stasi

Hate speech in private homes could become a crime, according to reports. The Law Commission, an independent body that reviews England Wales’ law and recommends reforms, has argued that the ‘private dwelling’ defence, which stops people being convicted of stirring up division because their actions were in private places, should be removed from the Public Order Act.

Harry Miller, former police officer and co-founder of anti-hate-crime laws organisation and pro-freedom of speech advocates Fair Cop, said the Law Commission’s recommendation ‘is a direct threat to the sanctity of the family home.’

Read article: Stirring up divisions in private homes ‘could become hate crime’

Proposals to prosecute individuals for hate crimes based on what they discuss in their own homes need to be more widely debated, free speech organisations have said.

The suggestion to remove the “dwelling” privacy exemption from criminal legislation is buried in a few paragraphs of the Law Commission’s 544-page consultation on hate crime published in September.

The proposal was spotted by the organisation Fair Cop, which campaigns against what it says is misuse of legislation to curb free speech. Sarah Phillimore, a barrister and member of the organisation, said it would encourage “state surveillance or people to inform on their friends. How else would they get the evidence? It will be like the East German Stasi security service.”

Read article: UK lawyers uneasy about plan to prosecute hate speech at home