A member of a Welsh alternative media outlet claims he was told by police to remove a video and warned not to call illegal immigrants “undocumented aliens” in case it offends ethnic minorities.
On Saturday, James Harvey, 19, filmed a call that he received from South Wales Police telling him that he would be “liable for an offence” if someone was offended over footage he had shot for Voice Of Wales.
South Wales Police have yet to respond to several requests from The Epoch Times for comment.
‘Undocumented Aliens’
On Friday, Harvey filmed a hotel in Cardiff, claiming that it was allegedly housing “migrants.”In a piece to camera commenting on the footage, Harvey said, “They are illegals, undocumented aliens, they are illegal.”
Harvey told The Epoch Times that on Saturday night, South Wales Police attended his parents’ house. Upon discovering that the police were trying to contact him, he called the non-emergency police number at 101.
In footage seen by The Epoch Times, a police operator struggles to find Harvey’s case, and then appears to find it registered under a “hate crime.”
“It’s regarding something you posted online yesterday,” said the operator, adding, “It’s regarding, you allegedly called them undocumented aliens.”
Later in the evening, a policeman called Harvey to warn him that he could be preemptively committing an offence.
“The concern was that somebody will take offence to it,” said the policeman.
“The reason the police are contacting you, want to speak to you, was to basically say look, heads up, take that video down. If someone sees it, that is of ethnic minority, or someone takes offence to it, there is going to be offences there against you for making that video. Because obviously hate crime is if someone perceives that to be something and if someone takes offence to it, you could be liable for an offence,” he added.
“I am halfway watching that video, you’re going to have to take that video down, that’s a bit strong,” added the policeman.
After Harvey said that he would not remove the video, at the end of the call, the policeman said, “At the end of the day you have been made aware, you are under no obligation to take it down, what you want to do is whatever you want to do.”
Reflecting on the experience, Harvey said that the situation was “extremely stressful.”
‘Done Not Through Error but by Design’
Fronted by Stan Robinson and Dan Morgan, Voice Of Wales regularly posts news content and presents itself as “the only alternative media in Wales that presents an opposition to the corrupt establishment.”The show has conducted interviews with commentators such as the British conservative Katie Hopkins, activist Tommy Robinson, and the American Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio.
Harry Miller, who started The Bad Law Project with the Reclaim Party leader and actor Laurence Fox, as well as family law barrister Sarah Phillimore, told The Epoch Times by email that the organisation is looking into the case.
Former policeman Miller also set up Fair Cop, an organisation that was set up in response to what it calls “Big Brother” overreach by various police forces.
“The regularity with which the police misstate the law strongly suggests it is being done not through error but by design,” said Miller.
“They have cynically calculated that issuing the occasional apology when caught is a price worth paying for a de facto police state. The Bad Law Project will be throwing the kitchen sink at this,” he added.
