News

Abusive Duo Sentenced

26 January 2014

By Lauren E. White

Bringing shame onto the North East, a man and a woman have been jailed for sending sick and abusive online messages over Twitter to a feminist campaigner Caroline Criado-Perez.

23 year-old Isabella Sorley of Newcastle-upon-Tyne has been sentenced to 12 weeks in prison and the other shamed coward, John Nimmo, 25, of South Shields, has been sentenced to eight weeks. After pleading guilty at Westminster Magistrates’ Court to improper use of a communications network, shaken Criado told of her relief that the judge understood the impact of the sick comments she received.

The vile messages were sent last July – anonymously as clearly the two were too cowardly to send their hate publically by hiding behind a screen. The victim claimed that the messages ‘heightened the fear’ because they were all nameless. The barrage of abuse occurred because of Ms Criado-Perez campaigning for a woman to appear on the five-pound note and she claimed she was ‘terrified’ each time the doorbell rang.

One message from Sorley, the Court heard, read ‘Die you worthless piece of crap,’ while another message read ‘go kill yourself’. Clearly, Sorley isn’t the brightest button in the box as one of her pathetic messages showcased a rather serious typo, ‘I just got out of prison and I’d happily do more time to see you berried!!’ – What do you mean? Bombarded with raspberries or blueberries? Take your pick, Sorley.

Nimmo also told Ms Criado-Perez that she should ‘shut up’ and made disgusting references to rape with one tweet claiming ‘I will find you (smiley face)’.

While this matter has completely spiralled out of control as we see examples of humans with low self-esteem bully a woman for standing up for what it is she believes in, there is always help. If you are receiving hate messages or death threats on Twitter, Tumblr or Instagram please be aware that there is always a block button that will instantly put a stop to the negative comments you are receiving.

If you are also suffering from online abuse, here are some help lines you can contact:

–       ChildLine (under 18’s only): 0800 1111

http://www.childline.org.uk/Pages/Home.aspx

–       Samaritans: 08457 90 90 90

http://www.samaritans.org/

–       NSPCC: 0808 800 5000

http://www.nspcc.org.uk/

 

 

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