A Tayside Twitter troll has been fined for a vile post mocking Celtic FC superfan Jay Beatty.
Gareth Lumsden was charged by police after Jay’s family complained about a tweet which taunted the 13-year-old over his attendance at the Sports Personality of the Year awards.
Lumsden, from Perthshire, wrote: “Congrats to Jay Beatty on his BBC Spastic of the Year award.” The vile comment was followed by the hashtag “special”.
Jay, who has Down’s Syndrome, became an official ambassador for Celtic after a video of him celebrating a goal at the World Cup went viral.
The brave youngster, from Lurgan in Northern Ireland, was a guest of honour at the BBC’s Sports Personality awards in December 2015.
The tweet was posted at the time of the ceremony, but was only reported to police in February 2016.
Perth Sheriff Court heard that Lumsden, 23, had posted the comment while at his mother’s house in Crieff.
Depute fiscal Tina Dickie said: “The post appeared after Jay attended the awards which were held in Belfast.
“The Twitter user’s account was in the name of @GLumsden93 and this was traced back to the accused.
“Mr Beatty found the comment generally offensive and as such reported the matter to police.
“The accused was caution and charged.”
Lumsden, from Stanley, did not appear at court but pleaded guilty by letter.
He described the tweet as an “error of judgement influenced by alcohol.”
Lumsden has offered his apologies to Jay and his family.
He admitted behaving in a threatening or abusive manner which was likely to cause fear or alarm by posting on Twitter an abusive remark regarding disability.
The offence is a breach of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act which was introduced in 2010 to tackle — among other things — online abuse.
The charge states it will be proved the offence was aggravated by “prejudice related to disability.”
Sheriff William Wood fined Lumsden £400. He said the penalty would have been £600 if he hadn’t issued a guilty plea at the earliest opportunity.
Earlier this year, Police Scotland confirmed it was probing a series of hateful comments posted about Jay on a football forum.
In January, Jay’s mother Aine responded to trolls on Facebook.
She wrote: “He is just a little boy who really loves his football team.
“To the minority that mock him, you don’t know him. If you did know him you would never dream of mocking him.”
She added: ““Thank you for all the messages and comments of support. We really appreciate it and together we won’t let the behaviour of others destroy a little bhoy’s dream.”
Lumsden’s account is still active, although the offensive tweet has been deleted.
