A sitcom writer says he was arrested at London’s Heathrow Airport this week, allegedly over posts he made on X. Father Ted co-creator Graham Linehan said five armed officers approached him when he stepped off his flight in London from the United States and asked him about social media posts critical of the trans community.
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer defended the police actions, saying they’re tasked with “tackling anti-social behaviour, shoplifting, street crime” and other offenses.
Linehan says when he saw the cops, at first, he laughed. Then they began reading him his rights. At the Heathrow police station, his belt, bag, and devices were taken, and officers placed him into a cell with a bed and a small toilet.
“They escorted me to a private area and told me I was under arrest for three tweets,” Linehan wrote on his Substack page. “In a country where paedophiles escape sentencing, where knife crime is out of control, where women are assaulted and harassed every time they gather to speak, the state had mobilised five armed officers to arrest a comedy writer for this tweet (and no, I promise you, I am not making this up).”
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Linehan describes arrest by armed officers
He claims the following X posts are what the officers interviewed him about. He shared screenshots of the posts in his Substack.
On April 19, 2025, he posted an aerial shot of what appears to be a rally, with several people holding the transgender flag. Linehan wrote, “A photo you can smell.”
And then, a follow-up one to that: “I hate them. Misogynists and homophobes. F**k em.”
And then, the next day, April 20, he posted: “If a trans-identified male is in a female-only space, he is committing a violent, abusive act. Make a scene, call the cops and if all else fails, punch him in the balls.”
During the police interview, officers questioned Linehan about each of the three X posts “with the sort of earnest intensity usually reserved for discussing something serious like… oh, I dunno—crime?” he wrote on his Substack.
He told them the “punch” post was a joke about the difference in height between men and women and “certainly not a call for violence.”
A nurse eventually checked on him and found his blood pressure to be over 200. He was taken to the hospital and placed under observation.
He said the only condition of his bail is to stay off X. “No threats, no speeches about the seriousness of my crimes—just a legal gag order designed to shut me up while I’m in the UK, and a demand I face a further interview in October.”
Rowling, Prime Minister Starmer react
Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, who rejects the view that gender identity can be different from biological sex, has been defending Linehan since news of his arrest broke. “What the f**k has the UK become? This is totalitarianism. Utterly deplorable,” Rowling wrote on X.
According to the BBC, Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s spokesperson was asked about Linehan’s arrest, calling it “an operational matter for the police.”
“But the prime minister and home secretary have been clear about where their priorities for crime and policing are, and that’s tackling anti-social behaviour, shoplifting, street crime, as well as reducing serious violent crimes like knife crime and violence against women,” the spokesperson said, as reported by the BBC.
