>An engineer who posted “burn any hotels with those scruffy bastards in it” online as violence erupted outside a hotel housing asylum seekers has been jailed for 15 months.
> was viewed by 1,100 people in 17 minutes before he deleted it
>“Go on Rotherham. Burn any hotels with them scruffy bastards in it,” his full post read.
>Prosecutors said the case had some similarities with the case of... Lucy Connolly, who was jailed last year for 31 months after she posted on X: “Mass deportation now, set fire to all the fucking hotels full of the bastards for all I care … if that makes me racist so be it.”
>Jailing Haythorne for 15 months, Judge Richardson KC said the post was “vile”.
>He reduced the sentence after considering the defendant’s clinical depression, his guilty plea at the earliest opportunity and personal mitigation
>“It gives me no pleasure whatsoever in sending someone like you to prison because you have many positive attributes in life,” he said.
>Haythorne had been due to be sentenced last week but his original conviction was quashed when it emerged that the offence he was charged with... requires permission from the attorney general before charges can be brought, and the Crown Prosecution Service had not sought permission due to an “oversight”.
A direct call for action, unlike Lucy's “for I care”. Posted after disorder had already begun, unlike Lucy. No dependent children. Lucy got 31 months and this guy got 15. Somehow, “clinical depression” provides an insane amount of mitigation.
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2025/jul/02/surrey-joseph-haythorne-jailed-social-media-post-x-southport-murders
>Ms Brasoveanu said Haythorne suffered with his mental health, which had affected his reaction to posts about the Southport attacks.
I wonder how losing a child and having a living daughter a similar age as girls stabbed to death might affect a reaction.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5ypl4kzyqko