The Father Ted co-creator Graham Linehan has received £25,000 in compensation and an apology from the Metropolitan police after his arrest over gender-critical social media posts. The 57-year-old was detained by armed officers at Heathrow airport last September following a 10-hour flight from Arizona.
He was arrested on suspicion of inciting violence in relation to three posts on X and was held at a nearby police station for 12 hours. The posts included a picture of a trans rally captioned “A photo you can smell”, a tweet saying “I hate them. Misogynists and homophobes. F*** em,” and a message stating: “If a trans-identified male is in a female-only space, he is committing a violent, abusive act. Make a scene, call the cops and, if all else fails, punch him in the balls.” Linehan insisted at the time that he had made a “bad joke” and had not intended to encourage violence.
A Met spokesperson said: “We recognise the considerable distress caused to Mr Linehan, and have offered our sincere apologies. This case prompted a significant change, which means the Met no longer investigates non-crime hate incidents. We believe this will provide clearer direction for officers, reduce ambiguity and enable them to focus on matters that meet the threshold for criminal investigations.” In a letter to Linehan, the force accepted there had been “shortcomings in the investigation, the arrest and the imposition of bail conditions”.
The arrest provoked political backlash, with Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch criticising the force’s actions as “thought-policing”, adding: “Sending five officers to arrest a man for a tweet isn’t policing, it’s politics.” After the apology was reported, Linehan reposted a link to the story with the message: “Thank you for everything” to the campaigning group the Free Speech Union.
In a separate case last November, Linehan was cleared of harassing transgender activist Sophia Brooks on social media but found guilty of criminal damage of their mobile phone outside a conference in London. He was fined £500, ordered to pay costs of £650 and a statutory surcharge of £200. The conviction for damaging the phone was also overturned on appeal.
