Free speech concerns have been raised after a Leeds man was sentenced two years in prison after being found guilty of inciting racial hatred with a library of stickers.
Sam Melia, 34, was in charge of an online collection of downloadable stickers that contained anti-immigration messages for activists of the “Hundred Handers” group.
At Leeds Crown Court last month, Melia was also found guilty of encouraging racially aggravated criminal damage because his collection was involved in multiple “stickering” incidents.
During the trial, jurors were told that members of the group would access the downloadable stickers that they could download and stick around their communities.
Melia was also found guilty of encouraging racially aggravated criminal damage
PA
The prosecution argued that the stickers were intended to stir up racial hatred.
The far-right organiser claimed that they were intended to “start a conversation” and that he was unaware that the stickering would count as criminal damage.
Melia was charged in December 2022 after evidence showed he established and maintained the database of around 200 stickers.
Counter Terrorism Policing North East said that many of the stickers were racist and antisemitic in nature.
They reportedly contained slogans such as “We will be a minority in our homeland by 2066”, “Mass immigration is white genocide”, “intolerance is a virtue” and “they seek conquest not asylum.”
The force added that Melia administered an encrypted social media channel that had over 3,500 subscribers, where supporters were encouraged to place the stickers throughout their local areas.
Fraser Myers, deputy editor of spiked online, told GB News: “You do not have to agree with a single thing Sam Melia believes to find his two-year sentence utterly chilling. Many violent criminals have been punished with far less ferocity than Melia has been for the ‘crime’ of producing some stickers.
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A fundraiser was launched to help raise donations for Sam and his family
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“Free speech is our most precious liberty, upon which all our other freedoms depend. It must include the right to express views that are objectionable, offensive and obscene – all of which apply to Melia’s far-right screeds. Hearing these views is an incredibly small price to pay for living in a free society.
“Worse still, censoring those views will not tackle them. It will only push them underground, where they will fester, mutate and grow. The authorities will only have succeeded in turning a bigot into a martyr.”
During court proceedings, the prosecution denied that the case intended to “stifle free speech” or “punish someone for their political views.”
“The question is whether, in distributing the stickers, Mr Melia was involved in stirring up racial hatred,” said Tom Storey KC, prosecuting.
During searches of Melia’s house in April 2021, police officers found Nazi symbols and a book by British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Mosley.
In reaction to Melia’s sentencing, Detective Chief Superintendent James Dunkerley, Head of Counter Terrorism Policing North East, said: “Evidence shows that large numbers of these stickers appeared both here in the UK and a number abroad.
“These expressions of hate were an attempt to bring upset and stir up racial hatred. It is important to highlight however that our communities are strong and will not allow those who seek to disrupt them succeed.
Sam Melia was jailed for two years
Counter Terrorism Policing North East
“Those that seek to bring hatred to our communities through actions such as stickering will be identified and brought to justice.”
Founder of the Free Speech Union, Toby Young said: "Sam Melia's conviction points to the shortcomings of the 'stirring up' clauses in the Public Order Act.
"Why is he guilty of 'stirring up' racial or religious hatred, but not George Galloway, some of whose comments about Israel and Zionism have been equally incendiary? Yet Galloway is now the MP for Rochdale, while Melia has gone to prison for two years.
"Either the law is applied consistently, without fear or favour, or it's not fit for purpose.
"It cannot be one law for right-wing white working class men and another for left-wing politicians."
Mr Young’s comments come after the Campaign Against Antisemitism said Galloway had previously declared Bradford an "Israel-free zone".