A Conservative councillor said he is “heartbroken” that his wife’s appeal bid against her 31-month sentence for inciting racial hatred has been dismissed at the Court of Appeal.
Raymond Connolly said the court had shown Lucy Connolly “no mercy”, and she had paid a “very high price” for her post on X, formerly Twitter, which followed the Southport attacks.
Mrs Connolly was jailed at Birmingham Crown Court in October last year for the July 29 post that said: “Mass deportation now, set fire to all the f****** hotels full of the b******* for all I care… if that makes me racist so be it.”
On Tuesday Lord Justice Holroyde, Mr Justice Goss and Mr Justice Sheldon refused her application to appeal.
In a statement issued by a spokesperson, Mr Connolly said the decision to dismiss his wife Lucy’s appeal was “shocking and unfair”.
He continued: “The 284 days of separation have been very hard, particularly on our 12-year-old girl.
“Lucy posted one nasty tweet when she was upset and angry about three little girls who were brutally murdered in Southport.
“She realised the tweet was wrong and deleted it within four hours.”
He added: “My wife Lucy is a good person and not a racist.
“As a childminder she took care of small children of African and Asian heritage; they loved Lucy as she loved them.
“My wife has paid a very high price for making a mistake and today the court has shown her no mercy.
“Lucy got more time in jail for one tweet than some paedophiles and domestic abusers get.
“I think the system wanted to make an example of Lucy so other people would be scared to say things about immigration. This is not the British way.”
Connolly’s post on X came shortly after three girls were stabbed and killed at a holiday club in Southport on the same date, sparking nationwide unrest.
It was viewed 310,000 times in three-and-a-half hours before Connolly deleted it.
Asked if Connolly losing her appeal bid meant free speech was dead in the UK, the Prime Minister told broadcasters on Tuesday he did not know the details of the case.
But he added: “Firstly, I’m strongly in favour of free speech. We’ve had free speech in this country for a very, very long time, and we protect it fiercely.
“I’m equally, though, against incitement to violence against other people. That has long been an offence in our country, and rightly so.
“So, as I say, I don’t know the details of this, but free speech: yes; incitement to violence: no.”
In a written judgment, Lord Justice Holroyde, said: “There is no arguable basis on which it could be said that the sentence imposed by the judge was manifestly excessive.
“The application for leave to appeal against sentence therefore fails and is refused.”
He added that the principle ground of appeal “was substantially based on a version of events put forward by the applicant which we have rejected”.
Giving evidence from HMP Drake Hall in Eccleshall in Staffordshire last week, Connolly said that when she initially wrote the post she was “really angry, really upset” and “distressed that those children had died” but did not intend to incite violence.
The court in London heard that Connolly’s son died tragically around 14-years-ago, and that news of the murders of the children in Southport had caused a resurgence of her anxiety around this.
In his written judgment, Lord Justice Holroyde continued: “Here, we of course have every sympathy with the applicant over the death of her son, and we can understand why she remains angry about the circumstances of his death.
“We can therefore accept that the shocking events in Southport had an impact on her which went beyond that felt by many others.
“But as the judge rightly said, she did not post a message of support and sympathy to the victims of the Southport attack and the bereaved.”
He added that she also did not direct her comments towards the Southport attacker, Axel Rudakubana, and instead chose “to incite serious violence against large numbers of persons”.
“The applicant’s personal history cannot significantly reduce her culpability for that serious offence,” Lord Justice Holroyde said.
Connolly told the court that during discussions with her barrister at the crown court she did not understand that by pleading guilty she was accepting that she intended to incite violence.
Lord Justice Holroyde said that in her evidence at the Court of Appeal, the judges found Connolly to be “intelligent and articulate”, and they were “unable” to accept that she “entered her guilty plea with no understanding of what it entailed”.
Connolly, of Northampton, was arrested on August 6, by which point she had deleted her social media account, but other messages which included further racist remarks were uncovered by officers who seized her phone.
Mr Connolly had been a Tory West Northamptonshire district councillor, but lost his seat in May.
He remains on the town council.
A statement on X, by the Free Speech Union (FSU), which funded Connolly’s appeal bid, said: “This is a deeply disappointing judgment.
“No one disputes the tweet was offensive but the sentence of more than two-and-a-half years was plainly disproportionate.”
It continued: “Two-and-a-half years for a single tweet is grossly disproportionate and it should trouble anyone who believes the law must be applied evenly, without fear or favour.”
