When Avon and Somerset Police slapped Christian street preacher Dia Moodley with a “community protection warning” for the ‘crime’ of criticising other religions, he turned to the FSU. With our help, Mr Moodley took legal action against the Force, and has now forced an admission that its attempts to silence him were “disproportionate”.
As first reported in the Mail, the force tried to prevent Bristol-based pastor Dia Moodley from “passing comments on any other religion or comparing them to Christianity”. It also sought to stop him displaying “graphic material”.
The Evangelist had become known to the police after holding up signs saying, “abortion is murder”, “all lives matter”, “God created them male and female”, and mocking followers of other religions for failing to acknowledge “God’s truth”.
Trouble began after Moodley arranged a meeting with his local policing team back in 2020, and claimed that officers had stood by and done nothing when members of the public spat at him, destroyed his signs, and told him to “go back home”.
In turn, Bristol police issued a community protection warning (CPW) that the churchgoer’s behaviour was having a detrimental effect on other Bristolians’ “quality of life”.
The force said the warning followed complaints about the preacher’s conduct that had continued for a number of years. Crowds had become “hostile” and “respond[ed] aggressively” to Moodley after he “persistently” made what the force describes as “abusive and insulting statements”, as well as displaying “graphic material”, which included images purporting to be mutilated or aborted foetuses.
At the time, a spokesperson for the force justified the move by saying that officers needed to balance the pastor’s right to free speech with the general public’s right to work and shop in the city without being caused undue distress.
In the warning, the Evangelist, and anyone delivering sermons on his behalf, was told to refrain from using any amplifier or speaker system while preaching or playing recordings of sermons in Bristol.
Police also said he could not display graphics or images that are, or purport to be, mutilated or aborted foetuses; that he could only deliver one-hour sermons per day that had been pre-approved by Avon and Somerset Police; that he could not use “any words or language that could be considered to negatively affect public health or morals or have the effect of inciting crime and disorder”; that he must not pass comment on other religions “or compare them to Christianity while in a public area”; and that he must not comment on “beliefs held by atheists or those who believe in evolution whilst addressing the public”.
With our support, and the support of ADF International, Moodley took legal action over these draconian restrictions.
In November 2023 the case was settled out of court by Avon and Somerset Police, which agreed to pay his costs and accepted that some restrictions in the initial CPW were disproportionate. Earlier this month, a lawyer working on behalf of the Chief of Avon and Somerset Constabulary issued a formal settlement which said five of the terms of the warning notice were “disproportionate”.
Reacting to the news, Moodley said: “This creeping culture of censorship is detrimental to all of us in society, whatever we believe, and we must challenge it wherever we see it.”
Our Chief Legal Counsel, Dr Bryn Harris, told the Mail: “The state does not hold a monopoly on truth and the ability to discuss and debate ideas, including religious ideas, is the lifeblood of any genuinely free society.
“Yet, repeatedly, we see this principle violated by unaccountable police officers and local councils who aggressively pursue their own ideological causes rather than using scarce public resources to tackle real crime,” he added.
In the UK, it has become depressingly common for the police to try to silence people who express unpopular opinions – even when it is perfectly legal to do so. But Moodley’s successful fightback against Avon and Somerset Police is the latest in a recent trickle of legal victories that offer some hope for street preachers.
In January, for instance, a Christian street preacher successfully won compensation from Police Scotland for being wrongfully arrested for an alleged homophobic ‘hate crime’. Angus Cameron was preaching in Glasgow city centre when he was handcuffed, searched and held in a police van for more than an hour in 2022 following a complaint that he had been using “homophobic language”. Cameron was never charged and denied saying or doing anything criminal but Police Scotland logged a hate incident, rather than crime, under his name. With the help of the Christian Institute he sued the police, and has now been awarded £5,500 in compensation and £9,400 in costs.
In 2019, preacher Oluwole Ilesanmi had a similar experience to Cameron, this time in London. Following complaints about supposed ‘Islamophobia’ in his preaching, Ilesanmi found himself summarily arrested. He was driven four miles in a police car only to then be ‘de-arrested’ and dumped at the side of the road. Ilesanmi later recovered £2,500 from the Met Police.
Hazel Lewis was arrested under Section 4A of the Public Order Act while preaching a biblical message outside Finsbury Park tube station in North London in 2020, after false accusations were made against her by members of the public. Lewis was later told there was “no case to answer” by a district judge.
Then there’s 71-year-old pastor John Sherwood, who was pulled off his platform (again in North London) and arrested for expressing his view that marriage was between one man and one woman – a belief of course rooted in the Bible and core to his faith. A year later, he was acquitted and cleared of all charges.
So, a trickle of good news stories. But not all speakers have the resources or perseverance to take the police or prosecutors to court. Moodley has his case taken up by the FSU and ADF International, for instance, while Cameron was supported by the Christian Institute, and Lewis was helped by Christian Concern. Sadly, speakers without such luck will probably end up doing as they are told by the police.
