Man convicted of hate speech after complaints by six pro-choice campaigners

Pro-choice campaigners on Thursday welcomed a suspended prison sentence handed to a man found guilty of hate speech against activists insisting the ruling shows there is no place for intimidation in society.

The Voice for Choice Coalition highlighted that “hate speech has no place in our society, and those who engage in it face serious criminal consequences”.

Six women had filed a police report after they received two “particularly violent and aggressive” comments from two men in their twenties following a peaceful, silent demonstration during the EU summit in Valletta in June 2019.

The group of women from Voice for Choice held a banner reading “Welcome to Malta, where women are incubators”.

They said the protest drew a range of reactions from the public and among the “many derogatory comments”, the two posted by the men had stood out as they incited violence against the protestors.

The women, the youngest of whom was only 18 at the time, filed a police report.

Following an investigation, the police found sufficient grounds to charge both men with hate speech.

One of the accused pleaded guilty to the charges and issued a public apology.

The second man “repeatedly defied court orders”, according to Voice for Choice, and only appeared in court on Thursday, escorted by police.

He was handed a six month effective prison sentence suspended for two years and a personal guarantee was issued in favour of the activists as protection.

Reflecting on the verdict in a Facebook post, two of the women said justice had finally been served after six years.

“I hope this can serve as a reminder that actions do indeed have consequences, and that sending people graphic death threats on the internet is not normal at all. This is a victory for us, for the pro-choice cause that is so used to normalised vitriol, and a reminder that we have come so far since that pro-choice stunt in 2019, and that we have a long way to go.”