A former estate agency manager from Sale has admitted to posting a racist comment on social media following the Euro 2020 final.
Andrew Bone, 41, who worked for Savills, was sacked by the company in September 2021 after posting a racist tweet about black England footballers following their Euro 2020 final defeat to Italy at Wembley Stadium. He had initially been suspended two months earlier, days after the incident.
The vile Tweet, published shortly after England’s Euros defeat to Italy at Wembley Stadium in July, had said: “N****** ruined it for us”.
The hateful tweet was directed at England players Bukayo Saka, Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford. Bone removed the comment minutes after posting it, but it had been reposted by others and reported to his employer, Savills.
Members of the public reported Bone’s post to the police and he was arrested three days later on 14 July.
Bone originally claimed that his Twitter account was hacked and called for police to investigate after Savills suspended him.
Bone went on to plead not guilty at court and a trial was fixed for 31 October this year.
The investigation continued, uncovering previous social media posts and cell site data which showed the device used to post the comment was in the same location as Bone.
The court granted an application made by the CPS to allow those prior hateful comments on social media to be used as bad character evidence at the trial.
Having seen the strength of the evidence against him, Bone pleaded guilty yesterday at Manchester Magistrates’ Court and will now be sentenced on 4 February 2025.
Martin Brogan, senior crown prosecutor for CPS North West said: “Andrew Bone took to social media to post a hateful racist comment, and in doing so, he broke the law.
“He removed the post soon after, but in the meantime the message was reported to his employer by a concerned social media user.
“Bone, thinking he could escape justice, concocted a story that he had been hacked, which he repeated to his employer, the police and the court.
“Today [Thursday], when faced with the strength of the prosecution case, he eventually admitted that he had posted the comment.
“We want supporters to show their passion without crossing the line into criminality and we’re working with football authorities including the Premier League and the Football Association, as well as with clubs and the police, to stamp out all types of offensive behaviour.
“Hateful and offensive comments around our national sport cause a great deal of distress and we stand ready to prosecute whenever so-called fans use racist, hateful or otherwise offensive comments, both in person and online.”