Twitter user fined for tweeting fun airfield explosve threat

Andrew Norfolk ,}

A trainee accountant who done a fun explosve hazard on Twitter after his internal airport was sealed by complicated sleet was found guilty yesterday of promulgation a menacing electronic message.

Paul Chambers, who used the amicable networking website to demonstrate disappointment at the intensity intrusion of regretful transport plans, becomes the initial person in Britain convicted of posting an descent tweet.

Chambers, 26, of Doncaster, South Yorkshire, told his 600 Twitter followers: Crap! Robin Hood Airport is closed. Youve got a week and a bit to get your s*** together, differently Im floating the airfield sky high!

District Judge Jonathan Bennett at Doncaster Magistrates Court fined him 385 and told him the summary was of a ominous inlet in the context of the times in that we live.

Chambers, who lost his pursuit as a association financial administrator after his detain and prosecution, pronounced that it never crossed his mind that any one would take the summary seriously.

The justice listened that he requisitioned a moody from the airfield to Northern Ireland in January, to encounter a lady he had met around Twitter where her alias was Crazy Colours. Nine days prior to he was due to fly, he learnt that assorted airports together with Robin Hood had been sealed by snow.

Chambers pronounced the message, sent in the early hours, was his approach of venting frustration at the probable delay of a outing to that he had been looking forward. Its wording, he said, was harmless hyperbole.

An off-duty airfield physical education instructor speckled the summary and alerted security staff, who contacted police. Chambers was arrested underneath the Terrorism Act, and questioned by detectives for roughly 7 hours. His mobile phone, laptop and home computers were confiscated. The justice was told that military printed 460 tweets posted by Chambers over eight days in January.

They enclosed a series of foul-mouthed tirades that stirred mutilated delight in court, and a summary sent a couple of hours prior to the explosve content informing Crazy Colours that he had motionless to review to terrorism if the airfield stayed closed.

Richard Haigh, defending, pronounced that the twitter should be noticed in the context of the denunciation used on Twitter. Referring to John Cleeses repetition hotelier in Fawlty Towers, the BBC radio series, he pronounced it had been a Fawlty-esque outburst. The summary competence be deliberate immature, uninspired or unacceptable, but it was not criminal.

Chambers pronounced he right away accepted that airports had to take all threats seriously, and apologised for whatever consequences have happened.

That was not my goal at all. It did not cranky my mind that Robin Hood would ever see at Twitter or take it seriously.

He was found guilty of promulgation a open electronic summary that was grossly offensive or of an indecent, pornographic or ominous nature, discordant to the Communications Act 2003.

In further to the fine, Chambers contingency compensate a 15 victims surcharge and 600 in costs.