TV writer and activist Graham Linehan was “proud” to have damaged a trans activist’s mobile phone during a dispute outside a conference, a court has been told.
Linehan, 57, snatched the phone of Sophia Brooks and threw it to the ground outside the Battle of Ideas conference in Westminster on October 19 2024.
The Irish comedy writer, who helped to create shows including Father Ted and Black Books, flew in from Arizona to attend an appeal hearing against his conviction for criminal damage at Southwark Crown Court in London on Thursday.
Prosecutor Julia Faure Walker, opening the case before Judge Amanda Tipples, told the court Linehan gained “a sense of personal superiority” from the incident, and expressed it in a post on X (formerly Twitter) on October 22 2024.
The post – in which Linehan refers to Brooks as male – read: “I’m quite proud that I grabbed his phone and threw it across the road. He was furious.”
“Clearly, Mr Linehan was pleased by gaining a sense of personal superiority over a transgender activist,” Ms Faure Walker said.
She further told Judge Tipples the court was “not being invited to take sides in an ideological debate”.
“Whilst earlier events provide context, the prosecution would invite the court to focus primarily on what happened immediately before Mr Linehan took the phone out of Ms Brooks’ hands,” she added.
The hearing on Thursday was shown footage filmed on Brooks’ phone in the moments leading up to the criminal damage incident.
While filming outside the venue, the activist approached Linehan and asked: “Why do you think it is acceptable to call teenagers domestic terrorists?”
On the footage, Linehan can be heard calling Brooks a “porn-watching scumbag,” a “groomer” and a “disgusting incel”, with the complainant responding: “You’re the incel, you’re divorced.”
The defendant subscribes to the view that human sex is not only universal, binary and immutable, but that it is a key organising category in society, which should not be subordinated to the subjective assertion of gender identity
Another video played in court on Thursday appeared to show Linehan grabbing or slapping the complainant’s phone out of her hands.
Linehan’s lawyer Sarah Vine told the judge the complainant is “determined” to see Linehan convicted as part of a “campaign” against the comedy writer for his anti-transgender activism.
The complainant, Vine said, “is seeking to achieve a victory against Mr Linehan because he is a high-profile opponent, by misusing the justice system.”
“The background to the matter before the court is the ongoing debate about the legal and social status of sex and gender,” she added.
“The defendant subscribes to the view that human sex is not only universal, binary and immutable, but that it is a key organising category in society, which should not be subordinated to the subjective assertion of gender identity.
“It is the case for the defendant that the allegation before the court is a part of, effectively, a campaign by a number of trans-rights activists – of whom the complainant is one – to discredit gender-critical activists as individuals for political ends.”
Linehan was cleared by a judge at Westminster Magistrates’ Court last November of harassing Brooks with a series of social media posts before and after the incident.
But he was convicted by District Judge Briony Clarke of criminal damage over his actions with the mobile phone.
The Bafta-winning writer is a prominent anti-trans activist, and was accused of harassment for branding Brooks a “domestic terrorist”, a “groomer” and an “incel” in social media posts.
In her verdict, Judge Clarke said Linehan’s social media posts may have been “annoying” and were “deeply unpleasant, insulting and even unnecessary”, but they did not amount to “oppressive” conduct.
Turning to the criminal damage charge, the judge dismissed Linehan’s case that he had grabbed the handset and threw it away to prevent Brooks committing a criminal offence, and said he could reasonably have known that it would be damaged.
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He was “angry and fed up”, said the judge, before imposing a £500 (€577) fine on Linehan.
The writer was also ordered to pay costs of £650 and a court fee of £200.
The appeal hearing at Southwark Crown Court is expected to continue on Friday.
