Did Brenda Leyland Have the Right to Due Process ?

[Lace]

Do you agree with Sonia Poulton’s doorstepping of Kate and if not, why not ?

Do you think Sonia Poulton was the first journalist to door step the McCann's?    The McCann's had journalists camping out the front of their house for months.   They also had the public shouting at them.


I believe Sonia Poulton is looking for recognition,  she jumped on the band wagon hopefully thinking it would make her name known.   Unfortunately no one wants to air her documentary as she won't cut BL from it.

[Venturi Swirl]

Do you agree with Sonia Poulton’s doorstepping of Kate and if not, why not ?

I don't agree with it, but it's not illegal and she is exercising her right as a journalist to do so.  I presume you think it was a heinous thing to do?

[faithlilly]

What were the timings then?  When was the dossier handed in?  When was it handed to Sky?  When did the police inform the dossier compilers that they won't taking any action?

I believe the public announcement from the police re: action being taken is further up the thread and was given some time after the Sky debacle.

[faithlilly]

No before.

How do you know ? Do you know when the dossier was handed to Sky ?

[faithlilly]

I think it was Richard Bacon who made a whole TV programme about confronting a specific troll who had relentlessly targeted him.  That was above and beyond doorstepping if I recall.  They had a meeting in which the troll was very contrite (I think, I may have made this last bit up, relying on memory).  I suppose Bacon would have been vilified for naming and shaming had the troll then gone on to kill himself.

I think if he wanted some real action to be taken lawfully he should not have done it.

[faithlilly]

BL belonged in a group who threatened and stalked the McCann's,  they boasted there were thousands in their group.

BL was also one of the tweeters who drove a young girl from twitter,  they said she was one of the nannies.  BL tweeted 'I bet she's scared now we know her address'   she also tweeted that the young woman was a prostitute,  I won't say what other nasty accusations she made about her.   Did BL care that this girl was probably scared that some of them would turn up at her address?

I seem to remember supporters tweeting that they knew BL personal details.

TBH it’s much of a muchness. They were all taking part in rather bizarre behaviour but afaia it was lawful.

[faithlilly]

How was she vilified exactly?  What nasty things did Martin Brunt say about her?  You could of course use the same argument about the media who vilified the McCanns, to the power of 100.  Which is worse - internet troll or child neglecter / body occulter?

Yes you could say that but BL didn’t invite the media into her life. The McCanns had a full retinue of legal support. It’s not comparable.

[faithlilly]

I don't agree with it, but it's not illegal and she is exercising her right as a journalist to do so.  I presume you think it was a heinous thing to do?

Yes I think it was absolutely wrong.

So if you don’t agree with Kate being doorstepped you must feel the same about BL. Thank you for the clarification.

[Angelo222]

A Question.
If you were aware of intimidating posts, hate posts etc being made against a named family and this was continuing week after week.
What would you do?
And if you chose to do nothing, how would you feel if one of these posters did carry out their threats.

I know of a young girl who hanged herself because of continuing social media intimidation.

The correct procedure is to report the user to the social media platform involved and to the police if necessary.  Sky News and Brunt had no business doing what they did, it was a cowardly thing to do just to create a story.  It is very noticeable that they don't approach hard criminals in the street but soft targets like pensioners.

[Gertrude]

I have no idea how many members of the public have been door stepped for tweeting.    You don't understand do you,   these people were stalking the McCann's,  finding out where they went and what they did.   It only takes one person to decide to carry out a threat that had been tweeted about on line.

You don't seem to understand - The thread is about Brenda Leyland. Not the others that might have stalked the McCanns.

   Funnily enough Brunt went after Brenda rather than these 'others' that we are told issued death threats and engaged in stalking behaviour worse than hers. Then the police found there were no threats or stalking to prosecute. Why do you think that was? probably because there were no credible threats.
   Wishing someone would suffer or saying you hate someone is not the same as credible threats, after all Kate McCann has done the same on a public platform.

[Alice Purjorick]

No offence but I think it's a really poor choice to use Hillsborough to illustrate this principle.

   Hillsborough was a tragedy where many people died and the inquest was a whitewash, the 'Troll Dossier' was a case of members of the public trying to police the free speech of other members of the public who were giving opinions on other members of the public. No comparison IMO.

 The person/s who compiled the dossier should be done for wasting police time imo!

 

Good post.
I concur.

[Angelo222]

That's the problem.
It would seem posting nasty and abusive posts is not a crime.

Neither is publishing a book referring to a policeman as a f....ing tosser three times. 

[Miss Taken Identity]

You ARE wilfully misunderstanding IMO - the dossier was not about one member of the public against another member of the public.  It was a compilation of dozens (hundreds?) of tweets and other social media posts made by numerous different individuals brought to the attention to the police out of (presumably) concern for the safety of a high profile couple, incidentally whose home address has been widely circulated amongst the same online group. 

What you seem to be saying is that taking your concerns to the police should be a criminal matter if the police don't view your concerns seriously.  That is utterly absurd IMO.

If the McCanns did not read reports about them why do others take offence on their behalf?   Brenda did wat she did aired her views, perhaps not to supporters liking, but the suppoters do not have the moral high ground on disgraceful behaviour. SOME WOULD ARGUE  the Parents of MBM, acted disgracefully in the treatment of their daughter- leaving her alone after she complained to them, set up a company, slagged of police, community  and the countries Judiciary. and the supporters followed like sheep.  Brendas life and death had no impact on them whatsoever.

[Erngath]

The correct procedure is to report the user to the social media platform involved and to the police if necessary.  Sky News and Brunt had no business doing what they did, it was a cowardly thing to do just to create a story.  It is very noticeable that they don't approach hard criminals in the street but soft targets like pensioners.

At the risk of fuelling one sceptics erroneous notion that I have knowledge of the dossier contents, I will add my thoughts..
Perhaps individual threats etc had been reported to the social media platforms.
Perhaps individual threats etc had been reported to the police.

The threats continue even to this day, and perhaps the people who compiled the dossier felt that if many of these posts were detailed and given to the police, some form of caution would be given.
As previously stated, I see no wrong in presenting evidence of concern to the media.
And as previously stated  the presentation of this evidence is outwith the control of those who were involved in the compilation of the dossier.

Can anyone answer my question?
I genuinely don't know that if a member of the public is stopped by a TV crew and asked questions which cause unease, can that person ask or demand that the footage be not shown.

[Gertrude]

You ARE wilfully misunderstanding IMO - the dossier was not about one member of the public against another member of the public.  It was a compilation of dozens (hundreds?) of tweets and other social media posts made by numerous different individuals brought to the attention to the police out of (presumably) concern for the safety of a high profile couple, incidentally whose home address has been widely circulated amongst the same online group. 

What you seem to be saying is that taking your concerns to the police should be a criminal matter if the police don't view your concerns seriously.  That is utterly absurd IMO.

   The dossier was initiated by members of the public against other members of the public. We were given the impression that there were dangerous threats in there and that all the people mentioned were rabid '[ censored word ]s' out for blood and issuing threats. Who told us all this about the dossier? - the people that hawked it to the press. It doesn't matter how many people were in it, they weren't doing anything unlawful. If anything only a handful were doing anything remotely questionable in legal terms. This is in no way comparable to, or could be the same in principle as members of the public trying to get justice from a large public body. With that I shall leave this particular discussion if you don't mind.

Vertigo -  the prosecuted thing was really an aside, I suppose I should have put some kind of international symbol for 'flippant' next to it but I couldn't find one   Having said that I do believe people running to the police over nasty stuff said on the internet is wasting police time.  Credible threats and actual harassment are different than 'nasty' opinions and are already defined in law.  There's no need to go to the media before the police have looked at it either.