Six retired Metropolitan Police officers have been sentenced for sending offensive and racist messages in a private WhatsApp group.
The group, who retired between 2001 and 2015, were convicted in November following an investigation by officers from the Met’s professional standards team and a BBC Newsnight probe.
The six former officers were sentenced at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Thursday.
All were given suspended sentences, ranging from six to 14 weeks’ imprisonment, as well as hundreds of hours unpaid work for offences under Section 127(1) (a) of the Communications Act 2003.
Five had pleaded guilty to the crime of sending by public communication grossly offensive racist messages. One had pleaded innocent, but was found guilty of the same crime.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said that they were all members of the “Old Boys Beer Meet-Wales” group chat, where “a number of racist, homophobic and sexist messages were exchanged.”
They served in various parts of the Met throughout their careers but all spent time in the Diplomatic Protection Group, which is now known as the Parliamentary and Diplomatic Protection Command.
They were not serving officers during their participation in the group.
“The sentences given today clearly demonstrate that they were not just shocking or disturbing jokes, but grossly offensive messages that amount to criminal behaviour.
“This case sends a clear signal that whenever our legal test is met, the CPS will prosecute these offences robustly.”
However the conviction was a sign of a “totalitarian society,” according to The Free Speech Union.
"The conviction of these retired police officers is extremely worrying, even though they didn’t receive prison sentences,” General Secretary of the Free Speech Union Toby Young told The Epoch Times.
“The state should not be policing private conversations between adults. This is the kind of thing you'd expect to happen in a totalitarian society, not the birthplace of parliamentary democracy,” he added.
He said that he hopes the ex-officers appeal the verdict “for all our sakes.”
The group chat was initially established in August 2018 for police officers to maintain contact after retirement.
Different Coloured Parrots
The specifics of messages were not reported on in PA Media. It said that more than 60 messages with offensive content were shared between members of the group during the two-year period, including references to the Duchess of Sussex, the late Queen and the late Duke of Edinburgh, and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.However, one meme was described.
The meme featured a picture of different coloured parrots above an image of children of different races, the court heard,
‘Grossly Offensive’
In November after convicting, District Judge Tan Ikram said the “absolute clear implication” of the post is that “black people steal.”“It’s a clearly racist generalisation and characterisation and caricature of ethnic people. I have no doubt in my mind that it’s grossly offensive,” said Mr. Ikram.
He added: “It was a message sent by the defendant on to the WhatsApp group and it was, I am sure, grossly offensive.
“This message was sent, I accept, amongst many other messages which must have existed on that WhatsApp group but sent not more than a month after a previous message (from someone else) which the defendant accepts was racist.
“The Crown have put it very bluntly –they say that he joined in. He joined in in this criminal offending by sending these jokes.
“I noted with interest how he reacted to other messages (in the WhatsApp group) which he said had been sent by his friends and, I have to say, I was troubled by some reluctance on his part to say at least one of them is racist at all.
“That said, that is the evidence he gave in court today and he has sought, in my judgment, to distance himself from his awareness at the time. I’m sure he was aware. He was aware because he said in a subsequent post ‘Oops, sorry not too woke.’
“He recognised that, when this was read as a whole, that it was grossly offensive and his attempt to say that the picture in itself can be considered in isolation in this case, I’m afraid, does not hold water.
Grossly Offensive Racist Message
On Thursday, the six men were sentenced as follows:Michael Chadwell, 62, of Liss, Hampshire, was found guilty of sending by public communication a grossly offensive racist message and was sentenced to ten weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months and 100 hours of unpaid work. He retired from the Met in November 2015.
The five other officers appeared at Westminster Magistrates’ Court in September, where they pleaded guilty to 19 offences under Section 127(1) (a) of the Communications Act 2003.
Peter Booth, 66, of Llandeilo, Carmarthenshire, pleaded guilty to four counts of sending by public communication grossly offensive racist messages. He was sentenced to eight weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months and 140 hours unpaid work. He retired from the Met in April 2001.
Robert Lewis, 62, of Camberley, Surrey, pleaded guilty to eight counts of sending by public communication grossly offensive racist messages. He was sentenced to 14 weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months and 200 hours of unpaid work. He retired from the Met in May 2015.
Anthony Elsom, 67, of Bournemouth, Dorset, pleaded guilty to three counts of sending by public communication grossly offensive racist messages. He was sentenced to eight weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months and 140 hours of unpaid work. He retired from the Met in May 2012.
Alan Hall, 65, of Stowmarket, Suffolk, pleaded guilty to three counts of sending by public communication grossly offensive racist messages. He was sentenced to eight weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months and 40 hours of unpaid work. He retired from the Met in June 2015.
Trevor Lewton, 65, of Swansea, pleaded guilty to one count of sending by public communication grossly offensive racist messages. He was sentenced to six weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months and 65 hours of unpaid work. He retired from the Met in August 2009.
