...but guilty of criminal damage

Graham Linehan has been found guilty of criminal damage to the phone of a trans activist – but cleared of harassment.

The 57-year-old Father Ted writer learned his verdict in Westminster Magistrates' Court today over the confrontation at a conference in London in October 2024.

District Judge Briony Clarke said she found Linehan seemed ‘genuinely frank and honest’, and was not satisfied his conduct amounted to harassment.

She said she did not accept complainant Sophia Brooks's evidence ‘entirely’ and did not find she was 'as alarmed or distressed' as she had made herself out to be over  tweets posted by the comedy writer.

However, she did find him guilty of criminal damage, for throwing Brooks's phone.

Linehan – pictured above arriving in court today – has claimed his ‘life was made hell’ by trans activists and said he had become angry after being filmed outside the  Westminster venue where the Battle of Ideas conference was being held.

The court had heard that the writer repeatedly posted on X calling Ms Brooks, now 18, a ‘man’, ’sociopathic’, a ‘domestic terrorist’ and a ‘psycho posh kid’. And when she confronted him he called her a ‘disgusting incel’ and a ‘sissy porn-watching scumbag’.

Linehan had denied both charges.

In a separate and much-publicised incident, the writer – who now lives in Scottsdale, Arizona –  was arrested by armed police at Heathrow Airport in September in relation to three separate posts about trans issues but the Metropolitan Police later said no charges would be brought.

He has called himself ‘the most hated man on the internet’, and told how comedy jobs ‘fell away’ when he started posting about transgender issues. A Father Ted musical was axed in 2022 because of his controversial opinions – and his refusal to formally detach himself from the project. 

Published: 25 Nov 2025