STORY
The Court of Appeal today dismissed an application by Lucy Connolly, upholding her 31-month prison sentence for inciting racial hatred over a social media post in the wake of the Southport knife attacks. It was also revealed that she had planned to feign mental health issues. The court decision [in .pdf format] stated:
“There is no arguable basis on which it could be said that the sentence imposed by the judge was manifestly excessive.”
Connolly, a former childminder and wife of ex-Conservative councillor Ray Connolly, posted on X last July:
“Mass deportation now, set fire to all the fucking hotels full of the bastards for all I care … if that makes me racist so be it.”
Her posts inciting arson were viewed more than 310,000 times before deletion, the tweet called for hotels housing asylum seekers to be torched after three girls were fatally stabbed at a holiday club in Southport on 29 July 2024.
At her October sentencing at Birmingham Crown Court, Connolly pleaded guilty to one count of stirring up racial hatred. Prosecutors told the court she compounded her offence by feigning a mental health crisis to avoid responsibility, explicitly admitting in WhatsApp messages that she would “play the mental health card” if arrested and deny authorship of the post if questioned. The appeal judges rejected arguments that her sentence was excessive, confirming the seriousness of using incendiary rhetoric to target a vulnerable group. In refusing Connolly’s challenge, the court noted the high-profile reach of her online tirade and the risk it posed to community cohesion. Despite a local MP’s demand that Ray Connolly step down from West Northamptonshire Council, he retained his position until this year’s local elections, where he was voted out. Connolly was told that she would serve 40% of his sentence in prison before being allowed to be released on licence.