Man jailed for 'terrifying' threats to Heidi Allen over Brexit
A pro-Brexit former Royal Marine has been jailed for 24 weeks for threatening the remainer MP Heidi Allen online, including posting aerial images of her home on social media.
Judge Michael Snow said Ian Couch’s social media posts and email to the former Conservative MP, now an independent, would have been “terrifying” and were “clearly threatening”.
Couch, 59, sent two tweets and a Facebook post on 10 January which included aerial photographs of the South Cambridgeshire MP’s home, Westminster magistrates court heard.
In the posts, Couch, who served in the Falklands, said he was “close to giving out her address to the people that want it”, prosecutors said.
He also sent her an email the next day in which he told the MP a lot of people were asking for photos of her home but he had refused because he admired her constituency work.
Snow said the tweets, Facebook post and email made it clear the former Royal Marine regarded Allen’s views as “treacherous”.
He added: “It’s quite clear to me that the cumulative effect of these on Ms Allen would have been terrifying. Those, in short, made it clear that you regarded her particular views as being treacherous.
“You indicated you were close to giving her address to people that wanted it. That’s clearly threatening.”
One of the tweets had referenced the scaffolding around Allen’s home at the time and said “maybe I should add a rope to my yellow vest order”, the court heard.
The judge said that another of the posts had included details which would allow anyone to identify Allen’s home.
He added: “That immediately put Ms Allen at significant risk.
“You followed that up with an email where you again reiterated your large following and reiterated there were people who were interested in knowing who she was and indicating that they sometimes get out of control, again, a very menacing comment.”
He said he recognised Couch had “served the public with distinction and bravery” and put his life on the line, but doing so had caused him to suffer from mental health problems.
He said the offences merited a prison term, as intimidating MPs was “an attack on democracy”.
He added: “If people are too frightened, too intimidated, to stand as MPs then the quality of public life is significantly undermined.”
The court heard Allen had felt scared in her home and village, and had installed panic alarms and emergency lighting.
In her victim impact statement, read to the court, she said she had decided to give up running because she felt she would be exposed to “potential danger”.
She continued: “I struggled to sleep and was nervous of any noise, particularly at night. I suddenly felt very exposed.”
Allen quit the Tory party in February and was the interim leader of Change UK until she left in June to stand as an independent.
Couch, from Elsworth, Cambridgeshire, admitted two counts of sending offensive, indecent, obscene or menacing messages over a public communications network on 9 and 10 January.
He also pleaded guilty to not turning up at a previous hearing date.
He was jailed for 24 weeks for the menacing messages and fined £120 for missing the previous hearing.
He was also issued with a restraining order banning him from contacting Allen directly or indirectly, save at official engagements or through a parliamentary aide.
The order also banned Couch from posting or sending any information relating to Allen’s “personal or private life”.