Another let-off for anti-semite

An internet troll who bombarded a Jewish screenwriter with vile anti-semetic abuse for nearly two years has been once again spared jail.

Nicholas Nelson, 33, sent abusive messages including celebrating the Holocaust and threats of violence to Lee Kern between November 2018 and October 2020.

He heaped similar online abuse on writer Joanne Bell between November 2019 and February 2020.

Nelson also left abusive voicemails to Jackie Emery on April and May 2020 after she took on a role at the Board of Deputies for British Jews.

In 2020 Nelson was given a suspended sentence for sending anti semetic abuse to Labour MP Margaret Hodge as well as abusing then-MPs Lord John Mann and Dame Louise Ellman.

He sent ‘vulgar and threatening’ to the MPs’ offices after they commented on racism against Jewish people.

In 2018 Nelson was again spared jail following similar abuse towards then-MPs Luciana Berger and Ruth Smeeth.

Award-winning screenwriter and comedian Mr Kern is best known for his works Celebrity Bedlam and writing for the series ‘Who is America?’.

Prosecutor Richard Witcombe said that ‘professional writer’ Mr Kern used his twitter account to both promote his work and speak out against anti-semetism.

‘On November 2018 Mr Kern received many abusive messages that were unwanted and which, as a Jewish man, he found deeply distressing,’ said Mr Witcombe.

In the messages, Nelson referred to Mr Kern as ‘disguisting’, an ‘Islamophobic white racist’ and just ‘another right-wing entitled person playing makebelieve he was a victim or a minority’.

Nelson then went on to target blogger Ms Bell through abusive emails sent between November 2019 and February 2020.

He told Ms Bell to ‘stop stalking British jews’ and called her a ‘piece of s***t’.

The court heard that Ms Emery, who had been working from home during lockdown, received many abusive voicemails diverted from her organisations main phone number.

‘You are a white supremacist. Suck my d***k,’ said Nelson.

‘For your organisation to lie about jewish people is frankly disgusting.

‘You ought to make Joseph Goebbels proud.

‘You are naturally born liars and disgusting people.’

In his victim impact statement that he read in court, Mr Kern called the campaign against the start of years of harassment by a ‘highly motivated Jeremy Corbyn fanatic’.

‘The anti-semetic abuse included wishing me and my family would experience another Holocaust, senteming intimating messages of Jews being shot and used as target practice, subected to disgusting pornographic and sexual deviant rape fantasies involving Jews and Adolph Hitler,’ said Mr Kern.

‘And despite Nicholas Nelson’s wish for the Holocaust and his desire for a new Holocaust to take place he told me it is I who am the Nazi I am the one who murdered my family in the Holocaust.’

Adam Norris, defending, said: ‘It is right he has changed his ways significantly. He has sought help.

‘He has, and I say this whist also understanding he has caused distress to others and caused real impact to other people lives, he has moved on from the dark place he was in those years.

‘He is not using social media, he is completely off social media.

‘The point of all of this is he is someone others sometimes refer to as a keyboard warrior.

‘The person who sits on the edge of his computer but who has no physical interaction with those he distresses.’

Judge Charles Gratwicke said: ‘Nobody sitting in this courtroom could feel anything but revulsion, sickness and downright anger at the type of behaviour that you engaged in.

‘If reading the vile messages, the disgusiting language that has been used nobody could feel anything but anger and revulsion.

‘It is when one reads the effect of your behaviour that the true nature of your offending and the harm it caused springs to life.’

The court heard that the anonymous comments were attributed to Nelson an intervention by charity Campaign Against Antisemitism, which led to him being charged.

Nelson, of St Neots, Cambridgeshire, admitted sending an electronic communication with intent to cause distress or anxiety and two counts of racially aggravated harassment.

He was given an 18-month sentence, suspended for two years, and ordered to do a 30-day rehabilitation requirement and 250 hours unpaid work.

The judge also issued a restraining order for all three victims and fined him £200.