Defamatory Libel in Anonymous Letters
| Published date | 01 July 1935 |
| Date | 01 July 1935 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0032258X3500800311 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Defamatory
Libel in Anonymous
Letters
By
THE
OFFICERS
IN
A
RECENT
CASE
ON
page 2of Volume
VIII,
No.
I,
of
THE
POLICE
JOURNAL
for January-March, 1935, there appears a note relating
to " Poison Pen
"cases.
The
paragraph has prompted this
article, for it deals with a subject which must always interest
the thoughtful police officer.
It
will generally be admitted that anonymous letter writing
is an art stimulated by various motives. Many police officers
and other persons will have become aware of this in the course
of their experience.
It
will not be denied, indeed, that some
anonymous communications have supplied information which
has proved to be of the utmost value and which has assisted
the police in the due performance of their duties.
There
remains, however, the class of anonymous letter
writer which does not come within such category of usefulness,
but
which, contrary to British Law, and otherwise against all
those codes of conduct which determine a decent standard of
human relationship, causes police officials much difficulty,
and often subjects the victims of its malign activities to
unspeakable mental torture.
It is frequently the case in the practice of this particular
anonymous art that letters and post cards, etc., are sent, not
only to the aggrieved person,
but
to his or her relatives, friends,
and business acquaintances.
The
general purpose of such
communications is to expose the aggrieved person to disgrace,
ridicule, or contempt, and either to injure him or induce him
to commit abreach of the peace. Similarly, there may be
contained in the offending documents a vilifying of a dead
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