Joke led to Terror Act arrest and airport life ban - in the UK

[PAXboy]

The UK police now appear to have become as twitchy as the USA. The '*' represent another popular social networking site that, for obvious reasons our hosts here do not wish to have detailed.

This is in the UK newspaper The Independent, today 18th Jan 2010.
******* joke led to Terror Act arrest and airport life ban - Home News, UK - The Independent (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/*******-joke-led-to-terror-act-arrest-and-airport-life-ban-1870913.html)

The bit I really liked was the man saying:
"I had to explain ******* to them in its entirety because they'd never heard of it" Which means that they arrested him for sending a msg to one of the most widely known forums in daily life. It reminds me of the judge in the 1960s who had cause to ask who 'The Beatles' were.

Still, the important news is that the Police do not have a sense of humour. I think I knew that but now others know it too!

[strake]

Just ridiculous. Whilst anyone making "jokes" like this actually in an airport can reasonably expect to get dealt with firmly, if this chap has the money or if a legal firm stumps-up to get a bit of publicity, then I would suggest it's taken to court. I think his ban would be overturned very quickly and set some precedence for this sort of incident.
Having said that, banned from Doncaster? Possibly not that onerous..:E

[radeng]

The term 'pig ignorant' comes to mind. As ignorant as mandelson!

Of course, if they are that ignorant, then one must question their competence to do any anti-terror work at all.

[Avman]

Twitthing is not exactly "private". Therefore, in the present climate a "joke" relating to aviation and explosives is a very stupid thing to do. I have no sympathy for him. Wasn't even funny!

[dubh12000]

Have they checked if Bin Laden has a ******* account? Osama has probably been tweeting away like a mad thing for months now....:}

[radeng]

So if someone puts up the recipe for a 'Bombe American', can they expect a visit from the plod? Before someone asks, it involves 32 egg yolks, 2 quarts of cream, 4 pounds each of strawberries and raspberries and half a pound or so of caster sugar......then it gets frozen in an ice cream 'bombe'.

[ExXB]

So far this week, we've got this guy banned for life; some idiot who goes through the wrong door at Kennedy and some other idiot who quip's "I hope it isn't a bomb" when someone asks him to watch something for them.

He didn't say "I've got a bomb" or "I'm going to blow up this plane". Of course he should have known better, but to be taken off the plane and arrested for this? :ugh:

[mikeday]

Most times the only way to see if any of these 'jokes' are truthful or not is by having them investigated. The intent behind posts (way in which it should be read/tone in which it should be interpreted) is not always clear from text whereas it would be if it was spoken.
If any of the said 'posts' had not been checked and it turned out to be truthful, there would be outrage that the police had failed to check up on or question such an obvious, and easy to find statement that had been made on a public site.

Please dont get me wrong I'm not saying that everyone who makes a joke should be arrested, but certainly on something that is in text form - it can be difficult to gauge how sincere (or otherwise) the person who wrote it was being.

[MerchantVenturer]

I agree with Avman and mikeday - the man's act was that of a dim adolescent; it was also of very dubious taste given that people have lost their lives in the past through terrorist acts at airports and on aircraft.

I would have expected the police to have rigorously checked this out. Just because someone posts it on a public website doen't mean he is not a pathological loony who intends to try to carry out his threat.

Had the police done nothing and some sort of explosion had occurred at the airport those who are condemning the police would have been queuing up to vent their anger at police inaction.

We only have the man's version of the incident too. Some on here seem to have swallowed it wholesale. Do they really think police officers had never heard of 'this popular social networking site'?

There are all sorts of ways to conduct interrogations: basic ones are to sometimes ask a question to which you know the answer and to feign ignorance about all sorts of things in order to try to draw out someone.