The young British record holder walked free from prison today.
What did Lucy Connolly, a 42-year-old mother and caretaker of an ill husband, hold a record for?
The longest prison sentence ever handed down for a single, solitary social media post.
Lucy Connolly has been released from jail after being handed what is believed to be the longest prison sentence for a single social media post.
Connolly, 42, left HMP Peterborough, a mixed men’s and women’s prison, with muted fanfare on Thursday after serving more than 300 days in prison.
She was jailed last year for 31 months over a comment made in the wake of the Southport attack.
An angry, heartbroken post made in the wake of the horrific murders of three little girls at a party in Southport, England, that didn’t last four hours before she’d deleted it.
…Connolly was jailed for a post she made on X in the aftermath of the Southport killings on July 29 last year, during a period of rising public tension fuelled by outrage about the murders and concern over illegal immigration.
In the post, she called for mass deportations and to “set fire to all the f—— hotels full of the b——- for all I care, while you’re at it, take the treacherous government politicians with them”.
She deleted the post fewer than four hours later, after it became clear that a large amount of misinformation relating to the identity of the attacker was circulating online, but not before it had been viewed more than 310,000 times.
Connolly, whose son Harry died when he was 19 months old, and who cares for her sick husband, later appealed unsuccessfully against her sentence.
And who, while in a prison containing some of the most vicious of Britain’s criminals, was treated as if she had slung a knife in Southport herself by ruthlessly woke and vindictive prison staff.
…Richard Tice, the deputy leader of Reform UK, visited her while she was behind bars and claimed she had been manhandled without provocation, handcuffed and stripped of privileges by prison officers.
He claimed that the treatment appeared to be “politically motivated” and designed to provoke a response from Connolly.
Her alleged mistreatment happened after she was told that she would not be moving to an enhanced wing with full privileges, but would instead be placed in a 23-hour-a-day lockdown in an area holding the most violent prisoners.
When she challenged the decision to move her, she was allegedly restrained by officers with handcuffs to take her to her new cell.
Sources said previously that the jail believed it had acted in line with policy and there was “no suggestion that the prison did anything wrong”.
An angry, heartbroken Xweet when, as Nigel Farage said this past May, there were ‘millions of mothers at that time, after Southport, feeling the exact same way….’
“We are totally appalled… at the growth of two tier Britain under two tier Keir.
“Lucy Connolly should not be in prison.”
Nigel Farage attacks two-tier justice and states Lucy Connolly shouldn’t have said what she said but believes the sentence was excessive. pic.twitter.com/V4WvDtHlTe
— Alex Armstrong (@alexharmstrong) May 27, 2025
Connolly has only been released now because the excessive time she spent in confinement (or ‘remand’ as they call it) prior to conviction was taken into account when calculating her release date.
There was no reconsideration or mercy involved in any of this. As if.
When childminder Lucy Connolly was jailed for inciting racial hatred with a tweet about burning hotels full of migrants, she was told she would serve at least 40% of her sentence behind bars.
After that, she would be released to serve the remainder of her sentence of two years and seven months on licence – meaning it would served in the community but under supervision.
She was sentenced in October, so her release on Thursday comes just 10 months after the 31-month sentence was passed. So why has she been released now?
It’s to do with how much time Connolly, now 42, spent on remand before her final sentencing hearing.
After her arrest on 6 August 2024, Connolly was held in custody until her sentence on 17 October, appearing regularly via video-link from the prison as her case progressed through the courts – a period of 72 days.
There are two schools of thought in Britain right now. Those who are thrilled to see her free and want some small measure of justice for the injustice done, and mouthpieces of the government like the BBC, who continue to fan the fires of discontent and rage.
Great to see Lucy Connolly released.
Note the very different headlines from the relatively decent Telegraph vs the pure enemy BBC. pic.twitter.com/tqauSPlJVu
— Nick Dixon (@NJDixon) August 21, 2025
Nigel Farage welcomed Lucy Connolly back to the world, as did Allison Pearson, a reporter who’s done a tremendous, fearless job reporting on the illegal migrants, Starmer’s indulgence of them, and the toll the government’s persecution of citizens voicing opposition to them is taking on British society.
My wife has dug out her Buck House Garden Party pink outfit to join the movement.
— Dan Williams 🏴 🇬🇧🇧🇪🇺🇸🇮🇱Leaver (@dan63uk) August 21, 2025
The Telegraph put together a short list of the more egregious offenders who walked while Lucy Connolly spent a year in what we would call a maximum security prison for a Xweet. It is pretty damning, even truncated as it is.
The rapist, paedophiles and terror offender spared prison while Lucy Connolly was jailed
Former childminder deemed more dangerous to society than those convicted of sexual assault or viewing child abuse images
…Connolly, who lost her son Harry when he was 19 months old and cares for her sick husband, deleted the post fewer than four hours later – but not before it had been viewed 310,000 times.
…While serving her sentence, Connolly was kept at HMP Peterborough, which houses other high-profile offenders accused of the most egregious crimes.
Among them is Virginia McCullough, a 37-year-old woman who murdered her elderly mother and father and then continued to live at the family home for years after hiding their bodies in the property.
Also at the prison is Rekha Kumari-Baker, a mother who stabbed her children to death at their home in Cambridgeshire while they slept.
Since Connolly has been behind bars, her sentence has been compared with those of others charged with what many would say are far more serious crimes.
Starmer is on the hot seat again today for his hypocrisy and the active role he’s played in eroding the fragile trust between the government and the people it is supposed to serve, not rule.
…Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, said: “Keir Starmer’s enthusiasm for prosecuting Lucy Connolly appears to contradict his own guidelines. She rapidly deleted the message and showed remorse. This suggests Keir Starmer is guilty of hypocrisy and double standards by supporting a breach of his own prosecution guidelines.
“Lord Hermer personally authorised this prosecution, in what looks like another example of two-tier justice bearing in mind the very long sentence given when compared to others who committed actual acts of violence.”
Lord Toby Young, the director of the Free Speech Union, said: “Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, should have listened to the advice of Sir Keir Starmer, the director of public prosecutions, and urged the CPS not to bring charges against Lucy Connolly.
“Sentencing her to more than two and a half years for a single tweet which she quickly deleted and apologised for has undermined public confidence in the criminal justice system, particularly when Labour councillors, MPs and anti-racism campaigners who have said and done much worse have avoided jail altogether.
“The public have concluded – rightly – that it’s one rule for people on the Right and another for people on the Left.
Lucy Connolly was driven home, and her husband, when caught watering flowers in the front yard later, said, ‘We’re just trying to get our lives back on track.‘
I wish them the best, but I do think that could be a challenge in the times that look to be ahead for Britain under Labour’s heel.
