A 38-year-old woman has been charged with a homophobic hate crime public order offence after allegedly shouting “shame on you” at people taking part in a Pride march.
Jamila Choudhury, from Walthamstow, east London, is accused of harassing participants as they passed her during the event on July 27.
Footage posted on social media showed a woman wearing a niqab repeatedly shouting “shame on you” at participants.
In the video the woman could be heard shouting: “God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.
“Shame on you, shame on all of you. Shame on you, you despicable people. Shame on you, you shameless people.”
In a statement, published on July 28, We are Waltham Forest Pride said: “This morning we were made aware of a video showing an individual shouting homophobic abuse at some in the parade. The police are looking into this as a potential hate crime and while we condemn all homophobic abuse, we also condemn outright and unequivocally all forms of hatred and abuse, including Islamophobia and anti-Semitism, and want to make it absolutely clear that this was one, lone individual and in no way do that person’s views represent the views of any section of the local community. It’s depressing, but comes as no surprise, that far-right commentators like Katie Hopkins have seized on this video and tried to use it to hasten their twisted view of society in order to stigmatise the Muslim community in Waltham Forest. We utterly condemn this, and any attempts to use this incident to fan the flames of discord between communities in our great borough.”
Stella Creasy, MP for Walthamstow, condemned the abuse in a tweet on July 27 which read: “Gutted to see this and clear such hatred isn’t acceptable anywhere let alone in our home town- proud that many from all faiths and none today including Islam joined the Waltham Forest Pride march to show Walthamstow really does mean welcome.” She ended her tweet with the hashtag “#loveislove”.
Choudhury was charged on September 5 and is due to appear on bail at Thames Magistrates’ Court on Thursday October 3.