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Former footballer Joey Barton has been found guilty of six counts of sending “deeply offensive” social media posts targeting broadcaster Jeremy Vine and television critics Lucy Ward and Eni Aloko.
Barton, 43, compared Aluko and Ward to serial killer couple Fred and Rose West, and described Vine as a “number one bike” in posts sent between January and March 2024.
Jurors at Liverpool Crown Court accepted the prosecution’s argument that Barton, from Huyton in Merseyside, had “crossed the line between freedom of expression and crime”.
But they acquitted the former Manchester City and Newcastle player of six other charges of sending a deeply offensive email with intent to cause distress or alarm.
Judge Andrew Minary KC warned Barton against wearing a British flag-printed scarf in the dock as a “trick”, and told the former footballer’s legal team he will not be allowed to wear it when he is sentenced on December 8.
He was reminded that the bail conditions prevented him from mentioning the three victims in any way before that hearing.
During his trial, Barton said he was the victim of a “political trial” and that his comments directed at football pundits Aloko Ward were merely “dark and stupid humour”.
He said he was “trying to raise a serious point in a provocative way.”
Parton also claimed that his Vine posts were just “crude banter” and that by using the phrase “bike nonce” he never meant to imply that the radio host was a pedophile.
Jurors acquitted Barton of a charge related to a post containing a fake apology to Aluko for comparing her to Rose West.
“She clearly belongs to the Joseph Stalin/Pol Pot category,” Parton continued in her post.
“It killed hundreds of thousands if not millions of football fans [sic] ears, in the last few years.”
The jury convicted Barton over a post in which he said ITV analyst Aluko was “just there to tick boxes”.
The post went on to say: “All from the back of [Black Lives Matter]/George Floyd bullshit.”
He was cleared of writing that Ward and Aluko were “Fred and Rose West’s football commentary” after the January 2024 FA Cup match between Crystal Palace and Everton.
However, he was convicted of a charge relating to another post in which he superimposed their faces onto a photo of serial killers.
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