Tabatha Caplan believed she was doing the right thing when she reported an anti-Semitic art show to the police. I posted about this last month – nasty stuff.
The 52-year-old dog trainer – who founded the campaign group Action on Antisemitism – also encouraged supporters to report the art exhibition in Margate to the authorities.
The exhibition by artist Matthew Collings had been fiercely criticised for its alleged depiction of Jewish people as devils, baby eaters, and people who control the government and media.
But Ms Caplan has now been told Kent Police are looking into her campaign of email activism to see if it caused a “potential criminal offence”.
“I was stunned when I saw the email from Kent Police,” Ms Caplan told The Telegraph.
Pictures of the offensive artwork started appearing on social media on March 21.
Kent Police attended the exhibition but decided the show did not “meet the legal threshold for recording a criminal offence”.
Ms Caplan drafted a letter to the force on March 24 and encouraged supporters of Action on Antisemitism to use her pre-written template to send their own complaint emails. Around 1,042 people individually contacted Kent Police
The letter called for a formal review of the force’s decision by the police professional standards watchdog, pointing out that “declining to act in circumstances where material is blatantly anti-Semitic risks undermining public confidence”.
But instead of addressing the concerns raised, Kent Police found and contacted the owner of the US-based website (that hosted the template).
The force complained it could not manage the volume of complaints, and suggested the emails were a type of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack, a malicious attempt to disrupt a service’s normal functioning by overwhelming the target with internet traffic.
The force’s email, sent on March 28 and seen by The Telegraph, stated: “This is essentially acting as a DDoS attack, taking those accounts out of action. . . ” Two days later, the force sent a follow-up suggesting they were “investigating whether or not any criminal offence may have been committed by the user”.
Ms Caplan has identified herself as the woman behind the email campaign, despite the threat of police action. . . “Anybody who is paying attention can see that we have a very serious problem, and the police are not protecting British Jews.”
