In Britain, Two-Tier Policing and a Two-Tier Judiciary

Civil disorder is rife in the United Kingdom. Axel Muganwa Rudakubana, a 17-year-old born in the United Kingdom to Christian immigrants from Rwanda, killed three young girls and injured others in a knife attack at a dance class on July 29. However, his name was initially undisclosed to the public because he was under 18, which led to speculation that he was a Muslim immigrant or an asylum-seeker. This speculation sparked violent riots against immigration and similarly intense counter-protests nationwide. Now, over 1,000 people have been arrested in relation to the riots, with charges ranging from violent disorder to other, speech-related offenses.

Law enforcement’s response to the chaos has renewed claims of “two-tier policing,” the idea in the United Kingdom that the police treat right-wingers more severely than they do other groups. According to the British mainstream media, two-tier policing is a “far-right conspiracy theory,” a “myth,” a “trope,” and a “laughable” notion, even though such publications previously condemned the police force as irreparably biased in other ways. Despite the media’s narrative, the British increasingly believe “two-tier policing” exists: A recent YouGov poll in Britain found that a third of respondents think that “those of the far-right” are treated more strictly by the police, while over 20 percent said “climate activists” and “those of the far left” are treated more leniently. But regardless of whether there is two-tier policing targeting right-wing individuals, the evidence overwhelmingly suggests a two-tier judiciary in the United Kingdom, wherein speech or protest deemed dangerous is punished harshly while other behavior brings about sentences akin to a time-out on the playground. 

The same judges who sentence rioters to time behind bars prescribe sunshine and an outdoor lifestyle to other criminals. This month, for example, Judge Mark Bury sentenced three men to over two years in prison each for violent disorder at a riot against immigration. Yet just a few weeks ago, Judge Bury advised Simon Pritchett, who possessed several hundred indecent images of children, to “get out more” because “what you have been doing over an 18-month period is downloading and retaining indecent images of children and extreme pornography images.” Rather than sentence Pritchett to prison, Bury suggested that he “get some fresh air and meet people.” After all, Pritchett lived in a coastal town.

The judiciary is also severely punishing those whose conduct and speech might have facilitated the riots. Judge Benedict Kelleher, for instance, sentenced David Spring to 18 months in prison for threatening gestures toward police and joining chants of “who the f*** is Allah?” Kelleher told Spring that “what you did could and it seems did encourage others to engage in disorder,” and merited a punishment to deter others from similar conduct. Yet this very month, that same judge gave Ozzie Cush only a 46-week detention for assaulting a police officer at a demonstration. Cush already had two prior convictions related to criminal damage. In Kelleher’s court, it seems, blasphemous speech and threatening gestures toward the police deserve more punishment than actual physical attacks on them.

One need not attend a protest in the United Kingdom to be associated with the riots because now all online speech — including tiny pictograms — are adjudicated in the current circumstances of civil disorder. Judge John Temperley sent Billy Thompson to prison for twelve weeks for posting a comment on Facebook that said “filthy ba*****s” with the emojis of an ethnic person and a gun. Temperley suspected “a racial element to the messaging and the posting of these emojis” and stated that “this offense, I’m afraid, has to be viewed in the context of the current civil unrest.” Apparently, Temperley cares about offensive pictograms but not illegal pictures: In 2022, Temperley gave no prison time to Christopher Emmens, who pleaded guilty to five offenses relating to 46 indecent images of children. Perhaps those illegal images would have warranted jail time if Temperley had detected a “racial element.”

The U.K. judiciary deems online speech worse if the account doesn’t have strict privacy settings. Jordan Parlour wrote on Facebook that “Every man and their dog should be smashing f*** out Britannia Hotel,” directed at a location that housed roughly 200 migrants. (The chain has over 60 hotels nationwide and has registered nearly a £40 million profit through the government’s asylum-seeker housing program.) Judge Guy Kearl told Parlour, “Although . . . you had no intention of carrying out any act of violence, there can be no doubt that you were inciting others to do so, otherwise, why post the comment?” He went on to say that, even though the initial post only received six likes, “it was sent to your 1500 Facebook friends and because of your lack of privacy settings will have been forwarded to friends of your friends.” Therefore, the messages “spread widely which was plainly your intention.” Kearl sentenced Parlour to 20 months in prison. Judge Kearl is apparently concerned about comments shared with Facebook friends but largely unbothered by downloaded child-porn content: In 2011, he handed only a six-month jail sentence to a man who possessed over 8,000 indecent images of children.

Even online speech in relatively private settings prompts U.K. judges to issue prison time if that speech codes as right-wing. Meanwhile, speech at left-wing protests gets no such treatment. In 2022, Judge Tan Ikram sent James Watts to prison for 20 weeks after Watt sent memes mocking George Floyd to a group chat. Later, Ikram gave no punishment to three women who were charged under the Terrorism Act for attending a pro-Palestinian protest while wearing jackets that had images of Hamas-inspired paragliders — even though they were all found guilty. (Perhaps unsurprisingly, Ikram was caught liking a LinkedIn post that called for a “Free Palestine.”)

Judges hand harsh sentences to criminals out of sympathy for their victims’ enduring trauma — provided that such trauma stems from racist speech, not sexual misconduct. Judge Rupert Lowe, for instance, sentenced Ryan Ferguson to nine months in jail for racially aggravated abuse due to comments he shouted at a football player. Yet Lowe gave no jail time to Nicholas Chapman, a doctor who repeatedly put his semen in coffee and gave it to a woman. Chapman claimed to have a medical condition that caused him to routinely ejaculate when using the bathroom, and that his semen wound up in the drinks because he didn’t properly wash his hands, a defense Lowe called “implausible.” Nevertheless, Lowe told Chapman in the course of his light sentencing that “you are an intelligent professional of previous good character with good references.” (The victim didn’t offer a positive reference; instead, she stated that “I have to accept that the mental and emotional trauma I have suffered throughout this will always remain with me in some way.”)

In Britain, it seems that animals have more rights than women and children. Judge Michael Stokes gave a twelve-month prison sentence to Keith Littlewood, a farmer who admitted to hygiene and animal cruelty, telling him that “You have betrayed that duty towards your own animals.” Yet he gave no prison sentence to Adil Rashid, an 18-year-old Muslim who had sex with a 13-year-old girl whom he met online. Stokes suggested this was not an instance of rape because it was “consensual,” although the age of consent for sex in the United Kingdom is 16. (Perhaps this case served as inspiration for Stokes’s recent novel about a man accused of rape.) Nor did Stokes give any prison time to Jamie Thompson, who had been filmed physically abusing a young girl and admitted to cruelty. Regarding this decision, Stokes explained that “defendants who are under severe stress or a genuine mental condition or disorder at the time of the offense should not be sent to prison.”

Indeed, the British courts evaluate the mental state of a defendant, which includes punishing perceived right-leaning thoughts harsher than behaviors associated with child predators. Earlier this year, Samuel Melia printed and distributed stickers that the Crown Prosecution Service described as “expressing views of a nationalist nature” with the intent to “stir up racial hatred.” The stickers had phrases like “It’s OK to be white,” “Reject white guilt,” and “They seek conquest, not asylum.” Judge Tom Bayliss said “the publication of this kind of material is corrosive to our society,” further telling Melia that “I am quite sure that your mindset is that of a racist and a white supremacist.” Bayliss sentenced Melia to two years in prison. Yet in 2017, Bayliss spared a man from jail who possessed child and bestiality pornography, stating, “I don’t pretend for one moment to know what possesses someone like you to get sexual pleasure from watching children as young as three, or six or seven being raped because that is what you are watching.” Bayliss thus illuminated a two-tier framework for responsibility: A “white supremacist” is guilty for holding that “mindset,” but a pedophile who watches raped toddlers is “possessed” by some nebulous external force.  

Maybe, just maybe, there isn’t a two-tier police or judiciary. Perhaps the United Kingdom’s courts are simply a casino where judges play sentencing roulette. David Walker, a man with 17 prior convictions for 23 offenses, pleaded guilty to a charge of assault against an emergency worker in 2022. Judge Bayliss did not send Walker behind bars, despite noting that “it’s against my better judgement.” Bayliss told Walker to “just go before I change my mind, count yourself very lucky indeed.” Certainly, there are people who get lucky in the British courts, and I’m ready to place bets: Anything — protest, speech, emojis, stickers, or perceived thoughts — that can be tenuously associated with the “far right” warrants time in a correctional facility to punish those who have committed wrong-think, and further warn everyone else.