You can’t say that

[ewx]

Someone on the radio, discussing Twitter abuse cases like this one, seemed to think that the thing that made a message illegal was being “menacing”. But the law is broader than that; from the Malicious Communications Act 1988:

(1) Any person who sends to another person—

(a) a letter, electronic communication or article of any description which conveys—

(i) a message which is indecent or grossly offensive;

(ii) a threat; or

(iii) information which is false and known or believed to be false by the sender; or

(b) any article or electronic communication which is, in whole or part, of an indecent or grossly offensive nature,

is guilty of an offence if his purpose, or one of his purposes, in sending it is that it should, so far as falling within paragraph (a) or (b) above, cause distress or anxiety to the recipient or to any other person to whom he intends that it or its contents or nature should be communicated.

I think that makes quite a lot of online unpleasantness illegal, although you wouldn’t know it from the scanty levels of enforcement.

Comments

[pjc50.livejournal.com]

Saying things which are likely to result in violence is covered by the public order acts, which effectively make it illegal to swear near a policeman.

[hoiho.livejournal.com]

I don't know much about England¹, but in Scotland a 2001 Sheriff Court case Kinnaird v. Higson, is a modern instance in which the court held that the mere fact that bad language has been used towards a police officer does not, of itself, justify a conviction for breach of the peace (a broadly defined common law offence, as the various public order acts don't run in Scotland). There is now a substantial line of authority from this case.

1] Although I believe that in England&Wales, Nawrot and Shaler v DPP 1987 took a similar line, in the High Court.