ReutersA man who sent racist death threats to former prime minister Rishi Sunak has been sentenced.
Liam Shaw, 21, of Birkenhead, Merseyside, admitted sending two threatening and offensive emails to the public email address of Sunak on 15 June last year when the former Conservative leader was still prime minister, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said.
The emails were spotted by Mr Sunak’s personal assistant and reported to the police.
The CPS said the language in the two emails was “racist, offensive and suggested Mr Sunak should be killed by the public”. He was sentenced at Liverpool Magistrates’ Court to 14 weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for 12 months.
The messages had been sent by Shaw’s phone and police traced them to his email address and a hostel where he was staying in Birkenhead.
He was arrested by police in September and charged with two counts of sending by a public communication network an offensive, indecent, obscene, or menacing message.
When the allegations were put to him by police, Shaw said: “I don’t even remember sending an email. I was probably drunk.”
Shaw must complete 20 days of a rehabilitation activity and a six-month drug rehabilitation course.
He was also handed a restraining order for two years which states Shaw must have no contact with Sunak or his constituency office in that time.
‘Racist abuse’
District Judge Timothy Boswell said at the sentencing: “Direct access to your constituency MP is a cornerstone of democracy.
“Misusing that access is detrimental to the democratic process. Clearly it is a highly aggravating factor for the offence.”
Matthew Dixon, of the CPS, said: “Liam Shaw took to his phone that night to send racist and threatening messages to a person in an extremely important public office.
“The Crown Prosecution Service has always and will continue to safeguard a person’s right to freedom of expression.
“But this is clearly a case where the comments made were utterly beyond the boundary of what is tolerable in a fair, just and multi-racial society, and passed into the realm of criminality.
“Racist abuse has no place, anywhere, in this day and age.”