Metropolitan Police will henceforth act on social-media abuse only where there is a clear risk of harm or public disorder, and a change in law is being sought. Officers are positioned between legal constraints and ambiguous online content, creating difficulty when assessing intent and real-world risk. A comedian was arrested at Heathrow over tweets alleged to incite violence; he reported being detained by armed officers and compared the treatment to being treated like a terrorist. Police believed they had reasonable grounds under the Public Order Act. Political figures urged the force to prioritise policing streets over policing tweets.
Mr Rowley said his officers are in an impossible position and should not be policing toxic culture wars debates as he broke his silence as over the arrest of the Father Ted writer over anti-trans posts on social media. Linehan claimed on his blog that he was arrested by five armed police officers when he arrived at Heathrow Airport on Monday from Arizona over three tweets on the platform X. He has said that he was arrested like a terrorist.
On Monday, officers arrested a man in his fifties at Heathrow in relation to allegations of inciting violence, linked to posts on X. The officers involved in the arrest had reasonable grounds to believe an offence had been committed under the Public Order Act. While the decision to investigate and ultimately arrest the man was made within existing legislation which dictates that a threat to punch someone from a protected group could be an offence
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