Ex-footballer Joey Barton has been sentenced to six months in custody, suspended for 18 months, for sending grossly offensive social media posts about broadcaster Jeremy Vine and TV pundits Lucy Ward and Eni Aluko.
Barton was convicted in November by a jury at Liverpool Crown Court, who found he will have "crossed the line between free speech and a crime" with six posts he made on X.
The 43-year-old must complete 200 hours of unpaid work in the community and pay prosecution costs of £23,419.
Two-year restraining orders were issued against each of his victims which includes publishing any reference to them on any social media platform or broadcast medium.
Sentencing, the Honorary Recorder of Liverpool, Judge Andrew Menary KC told Barton: "Robust debate, satire, mockery and even crude language may fall within permissible free speech. But when posts deliberately target individuals with vilifying comparisons to serial killers or false insinuations of paedophilia, designed to humiliate and distress, they forfeit their protection.
"As the jury concluded, your offences exemplify behaviour that is beyond this limit - amounting to a sustained campaign of online abuse that was not mere commentary but targeted, extreme and deliberately harmful."
Barton was cleared of six other counts that he sent a grossly offensive electronic communication with intent to cause distress or anxiety between January and March 2024.
Following a televised FA Cup tie in January 2024 between Crystal Palace and Everton, he likened Ward and Aluko in a post on X to the "Fred and Rose West of football commentary".
He went on to superimpose the faces of the two women onto a photograph of the serial murderers.
Barton also tweeted Aluko was in the "Joseph Stalin/Pol Pot category" as she had "murdered hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of football fans' ears".
Jurors found him not guilty on the Stalin/Pol Pot comparison, and also the commentary analogy with the Wests, but ruled the superimposed image was grossly offensive.
He was also convicted of a post in relation to Aluko in which he wrote: "Only there to tick boxes. DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) is a load of s***. Affirmative action. All off the back of the BLM (Black Lives Matter)/George Floyd nonsense".
The ex-Manchester City, Newcastle United and Marseille player - now a social commentator with 2.7m followers on X - is said to have suggested Vine had a sexual interest in children after the TV and radio presenter sent a message querying whether Barton had a "brain injury".
Barton repeatedly referred to Vine as "bike nonce" and asked him: "Have you been on Epstein Island? Are you going to be on these flight logs? Might as well own up now because I'd phone the police if I saw you near a primary school on ya bike."
He was convicted over the Epstein post and a tweet in which he said: "Oh @the JeremyVine Did you Rolf-aroo and Schofield go out on a tandem bike ride? You big bike nonce ya".
Barton was also found guilty of other tweets in relation to Vine in which he referred to him as "bike nonce" and said: "If you see this fella by a primary school call 999," and "Beware Man with Camera on his helmets cruising past primary schools. Call the Cops if spotted".
He was cleared of guilt over three remaining tweets referring to Vine.
More to follow...
