Irish comedy writer Graham Linehan, co-creator of Father Ted, has been cleared of harassing a transgender activist on social media but found guilty of criminal damage to their mobile phone. The verdict was delivered at Westminster Magistrates' Court on Tuesday, where the 57-year-old appeared in person after flying from Arizona.
Linehan denied harassing Sophia Brooks on social media between 11 and 27 October 2024, and a charge of criminal damage to their phone on 19 October 2024 outside the Battle of Ideas conference in Westminster. Judge Clarke fined him £500, ordered him to pay £650 in costs and a £200 statutory surcharge, with 28 days to pay.
The court heard that Brooks had been photographing delegates during a speech by Fiona McAnena of the gender-critical campaign group Sex Matters. Outside the event, Brooks asked Linehan: “Why do you think it is acceptable to call teenagers domestic terrorists?” Linehan responded by calling Brooks a “sissy porn-watching scumbag”, a “groomer” and a “disgusting incel”. The judge found Linehan took Brooks’s phone because he was “angry and fed up”, damaging it by knocking it to the ground.
Judge Clarke ruled she was “not sure to the criminal standard” that Linehan demonstrated hostility based on Brooks being transgender, but noted the offence was aggravated because Brooks was 17 at the time. She added she did not find Brooks “was as alarmed or distressed” as portrayed. Prosecutor Julia Faure Walker said Linehan wrote “repeated, abusive, unreasonable” social media posts about Brooks, referring to him as Tarquin.
Linehan’s lawyer, Sarah Vine KC, described the complainant’s conduct as “provocative” and said the case involved “political point-scoring”. She added that Linehan’s costs had been “enormous” due to a “momentary lapse of control”. Linehan said his “life was made hell” by trans activists and called Brooks a “young soldier in the trans activist army”. He told journalists outside court he hoped the not guilty verdict would mean “people in the future won’t be subject to those kind of tactics”.
