Man arrested in Scotland after vile posts about Celtic fan Wee Jay

A man has been arrested in Scotland after a vile tweet was posted on Twitter about Lurgan Celtic fan Wee Jay Beatty.
Jay BeattyJay Beatty
Jay Beatty

It follows widespread disgust after it was posted by an apparent Hearts fan following the game on Sunday against Celtic.

Police Scotland revealed that an 18-year-old man has been charged in connection with communications offences.

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A spokeswoman said: “A report will be submitted to the Procurator Fiscal.”

Young Jay’s father Martin had lambasted the sectarian tweet as ‘disgusting’.

Mr Beatty this week described his horror at landing home from the Celtic Hearts match on Sunday and reading the dreadful post.

Jay, who is an avid Celtic fan like his father, had been attending the match in Edinburgh.

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After the match, which Hearts won 4-0, a tweet by an apparent Hearts fan said: “This is how it feels to be Celtic paedophiles again and you know wee jay beatie won’t see 10 in a row.” followed by an image of a Union flag.

It is similar to a tweet which appeared in August although this Twitter user misspelt Jay’s surname.

Posting a copy of Sunday’s tweet, Jay’s dad Martin said: “Hearts fully deserved to win on Sunday, fought and won every ball so well done on a great win but getting off the plane with Jay to see this all over social media is disgusting.

“Enjoy your result but wishing the death of a child because of the team he loves is shameful and is wrong.”

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The tweet appears to have been deleted from the Twitter user’s page, however, another tweet stating “No apology no surrender” has since appeared.

It is the latest in a string of sectarian abuse and online trolling against the Lurgan schoolboy who has Downs Syndrome.

After Mr Beatty revealed his upset at the dreadful tweet, there was a huge outpouring of support for the family.

Such was the support from the people of his home town of Lurgan, his adopted city of Glasgow and throughout the world, Mr Beatty’s message was liked by almost 2,500 people on Facebook and shared almost 1,500 times.

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Messages of support were also written from fans of all factions from Hearts, Celtic, Rangers and others backing the Beatty family.

There was huge criticism of the man who tweeted the comment.

Wee Jay, as he is affectionately known and who has been an ambassador for Celtic FC, rose to prominence when he was plucked from the crowd by his idol Georgios Samaras to celebrate a league win.

He is a firm favourite in Scotland having been invited to a number of cross community and social events.

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