SD v Panzzrr 2025 Crim 54
SD v Panzzrr [2025] Crim 54
| Date of judgment | 5th May 2025 |
|---|---|
| Judge | Judge Benbookworm |
| Charges |
|
| Verdict | Not guilty of 1 charge of First Degree Hate Speech |
| Sentence | N/A |
| Applicable persuasive precedent |
|
JUDGMENT by Judge Benbookworm
Intro
[1] The State alleges one charge of first degree hate speech, under Criminal Code 2020 Article 55a, which requires that the accused:
§1.1. Submit, post, or relay speech that is upsetting, demeaning, or humiliating about a person’s or a group of person’s protected characteristics, and §1.2. Had the intention to cause apprehension, or acted with reckless disregard as to whether their actions would cause apprehension.
[2] The mens rea in §1.2 is to be rebuttably presumed per §6.
Summary of Prosecution
[3] The prosecution submitted a screenshot as evidence. The screenshot indicates that User A had submitted an image that is presumed to be of their girlfriend, and the screenshot indicates that she is brown and South African. The accused had asked "Why is she brown". The prosecutor himself (presumably in response to User A, rather than the accused), announced an arrest for doxxing. User B directly responded to the accused that User A is South African, as an explanation for why the depicted person is brown. Without using the reply function to specify which message was being responded to, the accused then sent "Unfortunate".
[4] Both being brown and being South African are unquestionably protected characteristics under Article 14 of the Constitution.
[5] The prosecution represents that saying a protected characteristic is "Unfortunate" is comparable to saying such is "saddening" under the fourth charge in SD v Mooklyn 2021 Crim 4.
Summary of Defense
[6] The defense did not contest that replying "unfortunate" to someone being South African could be construed as upsetting, but argues that multiple threads of conversation are present.
Considerations
[7] Thus the questions before me:
- [7.1] What was the accused responding to when they said "Unfortunate"?
- [7.2] Has the defense rebutted the presumption of "intention to cause apprehension"?
[8] I agree with the prosecutor that: "I believe it is futile to imagine all 1000 scenarios of what has happened". Like in SD v Mooklyn 2021 Crim 4, I turn to Occam's razor. There is not a reasonable doubt as to the message the accused was replying to: it was regarding the photographed individual's protected characteristics. The comment "Unfortunate" was posted two minutes after the other messages. At the normal rate of messages in #general, this is not to be considered simultaneous; the accused would have clearly seen the comment about being South African.
[9] The defense relies upon assertions that the mens rea here is nebulous. The defense also pointed to a slippery slope of combining broad interpretations of context with existing precedent already giving broad interpretations of "upsetting".
[10] The Courtroom Procedures Act 2025 Article 13§5, instructs the court to take judicial notice of all SimDem law and the meaning of English words. An online version of Black's Law Dictionary, 2nd Ed. firmly juxtaposes "apprehension" with "fear". The Oxford English Dictionary likewise points to apprehension meaning "Fear as to what may happen; dread." As does Merriam-Webster: "suspicion or fear especially of future evil: foreboding".
[11] In SD v Mooklyn (Remanded) 2023 Crim 1 that court finds that wanting to "end them" causes apprehension. I agree that such would be a source of fear.
[12] I find reasonable doubt that describing someone's protected characteristics as "Unfortunate" can be described as causing apprehension.
[13] Now that reasonable doubt has been established, I must contemplate the Criminal Code 2020 Article 3§3, and my discretion to declare a mistrial where a different crime should be charged. However, the prosecution had originally brought a count each of first degree and second degree hate speech, and already used their discretion to pursue the first degree charge as more appropriate.
Verdict
[14] I find the accused not guilty of first degree hate speech.