The Telegraph has reported that a Deaf man has been prosecuted after a police officer understood that the Deaf man had called him a “pig” in sign language.
Extract:
A deaf man has been prosecuted after he called a police officer a “pig” in sign language.
The officer who arrested Linley Hassan, 25, understood the insult, a court heard.
He had been called to McDonalds in Kendal, Cumbria, after reports of a man “causing difficulties”, South Cumbria Magistrates Court was told.
Hassan, 25, of no fixed address, refused to leave the restaurant and became “confrontational” with the police.
Peter Kelly, prosecuting, said: “He was making a sign that the officer, who understood sign language, knew to mean ‘pig’.”
Read the full story here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/11493808/Deaf-man-prosecuted-after-called-police-officer-a-pig-in-sign-language.html
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Administrator
March 26, 2015
What Crown Prosecutor allowed this to go to court? Absolute disgrace! I speak from experience as such an erstwhile Prosecutor.
“Pig” and “Police” go together as much as do the epithets Copper, Bobby, Rozzer and Filth. It is inconceivable that any police officer would recognize this word as anything other than one of a selection of non-glamorous alternatives and, thereby, as no more offensive than the various derogative epithets used by the Police for those they arrest – “perp”, “IC1”, “IC3”, etc. The whole purpose is to avoid saying what you really mean and, perhaps, really think.
Sauce for the goose? Get real up there in Kendal.
Deafnotdaft
March 27, 2015
The article says the guy was charged with drunk and disorderly. He pleaded guilty. So the CPS was right to take the case to court. I think we can assume that the “pig” issue is a red herring, exploited by the journalist for the sake of a more interesting story.