robitusson
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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rs-teenager-racially-harassing-neighbour.html
It isn't a crime to call the Irish leprechauns: Court clears teenager of racially harassing neighbour
By JAMES TOZER
31st October 2008
Small and mischievous, they're the green-clad little people who are synonymous with the Emerald Isle.
The question a court prepared to wrestle with was whether calling your Irish neighbour a '******* leprechaun' amounts to racial abuse.
Andeliza Tucker,18, faced a trial costing thousands after the alleged remark led to police action.
However common sense prevailed on Thursday when her lawyer, Louise McCloskey - herself of Irish ancestry - successfully argued that the prosecution was 'political correctness gone mad'.
Miss Tucker was arrested after her neighbour, mother of five Eleanor Vince, who is Irish, claimed the leprechaun comment was directed at her during the latest chapter in a long running feud.
After being questioned, the teenager was charged with racially aggravated harassment, an offence which carries up to two years' imprisonment.
When the case came before a judge at Liverpool Crown Court, Miss McCloskey argued that her client should never have been prosecuted.
Crown lawyer Michael Stephenson then conceded that describing someone as a 17th century mythical being was not a straightforward racial insult.
He admitted the Irish had put a lot of effort into marketing the leprechaun as an Irish symbol before concluding with a reference to the leprechaun's penchant for hoarding treasure.
Mr Stephenson said: 'There is a small pot of gold to Miss McCloskey's rainbow. I formally offer no evidence.'
Dismissing the case, Judge Bryn Holloway told Miss Tucker that he hoped she and her neighbour in Garston, Liverpool, could in future live with a bit more tolerance of each other.
Miss Tucker had claimed that when the remark was made last June, she had simply been talking to her sister about leprechauns after seeing one featured in a film she'd been watching.
The Crown Prosecution Service said Miss Tucker had been prosecuted because she had also allegedly threatened to kick her pregnant neighbour's baby 'out of her stomach' and had previously been given a fixed penalty notice for harassment.
After the case, Miss Tucker, who is black, welcomed the decision and claimed her neighbour had made racial taunts towards her.