Christian sentenced for gay death threat
A Christian man who threatened to kill the head of Britain’s largest LGBT rights organisation, Stonewall, has been given a suspended sentence.
Anthony Ryan was found guilty of making threats to kill and was sentenced to eight months imprisonment – which was suspended for 18 months, UK gay news site PinkPaper reports.
He has also been given a community order and will be supervised by the probation service for 12 months.
The case is thought to be the first case of its kind in the UK.
Ryan had threatened Ben Summerskill (pictured), the chief executive of Stonewall, in an email in January after Summerskill published an article about a gay couple (Steven Preddy and Martyn Hall) who claimed they were discriminated against by Christian hotel owners who wouldn’t let them share a bed.
Stonewall immediately reported the threat to police who later arrested Ryan.
The email to Summerskill read:
“With regard to the recent so-called victory that evil sexual weirdos Steven Preddy and Martyn Hall had against decent law-abiding B&B owners Peter and Hazelmary Bull. It is my duty to inform your evil organisation that, despite what the government says, according to the holy Christian Bible, homosexuality is in fact illegal… I have therefore decided to embark upon a campaign of terror against you Chief Executive Dame Ben Summerskill and all those that seek to support the so-called human rights of the Homosexual community… It is going to give me great pleasure to put a bullet in the head of Dame Ben Summerskill, Steven Preddy and Martyn Hall and any other homosexual vermin that I have the misfortune to come across… I suggest that the people mentioned in this email and indeed all evil biggoted [sic] Homosexual scum start making their funeral arrangements.”
Read more about the case over at PinkPaper.
Would be more impressive he he could learn how to spell ‘bigoted’. Apparently skills like spelling are secondary to the ability to hate when it comes to religious groups.
He’s obviously a lunatic, just like alot of “christians”.
Charming fellow isn’t he – not.
Good to see that the courts at least take it seriously. Hopefully his employer would have had something to say to him about it too. Like there’s the door – piss off
Ryan is more than usually candid for a Christian these days. Traditionally, their response to difference was torture and mass murder, but now many of them understand that modern secular governments won’t let them get away with it any more. Still, their vanity, malice, and wilful ignorance shines through (they are the voice of God, after all) in their current campaigns–denying marriage to same-sex couples, for example–to use the power of the state to force their beliefs on everyone else.
he’s gonna make the best bitch in prison! hope it hurts REAL baaaad!
Since there was only a threat and no actual physical assault a suspended sentence would seem to be appropriate. Though it would have been nice if he was forced to also pay a fine in the form of a sizeable donation to Stonewall.
How is this Christian behaviour? How is this compassion towards your fellow man? I’m appalled, utterly appalled at this man’s hate.