Court Confirms Convictions For Twitter Airport Hoaxer

27-year old Paul Chambers has lost his appeal to overturn his convinction after having been found guiilty of threatening to blow up the Robin Hood airport near Doncaster.

He has been found guilty during his retrial by Judge Jacqueline Davies who believe that the 140-character tweet of the former accountant was a "menace" and charged him of sending a message that was "grossly offensive or or an incendent, obscene or menacing character".

The incident which happened last year was caused by the fact that the airport was closed following heavy snow falls as he made his way to meet someone.

Chambers has been been ordered to pay £2000 in legal bills on top of the original legal costs. He has also gained a criminal record for his spur-of-the moment tweet.

Actor Stephen Fry offered to pay Chambers' fine and the latter received the support of a number of high profile backers including comedian Dave Gorman.

Many have questionned whether the court decision could effectively mark the end of freedom of speech on Twitter with everyone having to take care of what they write.

According to the Guardian, Chambers said that he wouldn't mind if they had told him off for being stupid before adding that "this was clearly how they saw things really, but it wasn't like that".

via itproportal.com