British-Indian Man Acquitted by Spanish Court Over Plane Threat Joke

 

A Spanish court has acquitted a British-Indian man, Aditya Verma, of public disorder charges related to a joke he made in 2022 about being a member of the Taliban and planning to blow up a flight from London's Gatwick to Menorca, Spain.

Verma, who admitted to making the comment in a private Snapchat group in July 2022, argued that he never intended to cause public distress. The judge in Madrid ruled on Friday that there was no evidence of a real threat, stating that "no explosive... was found that would lead one to believe it was a real threat."

The trial, held at the National Court in Madrid a year-and-a-half after the incident, resulted in the judge clearing Verma, who hails from Orpington, Kent, of any wrongdoing.

The message, initially shared with friends before boarding the plane, was detected by UK security services, who alerted Spanish authorities while the easyJet plane was still in flight. In response, two Spanish F-18 fighter jets escorted the aircraft, and a search was conducted upon landing in Menorca.

Verma, then 18 years old, was subsequently arrested, spending two days in a Spanish police cell before being released on bail. If found guilty, the university student could have faced a fine of up to 22,500 euros and additional expenses of 95,000 euros for the scrambled jets' cost.

One aspect under scrutiny during the trial was how the private message, sent through the encrypted app Snapchat, became known to security services. Despite theories suggesting interception via Gatwick's Wi-Fi network, the airport denied having such capabilities. The judge concluded that, for unknown reasons, the message was captured by security mechanisms in England when the plane was over French airspace.

The judgment emphasized the private nature of the message, stating that Verma could not have reasonably assumed that the joke shared with friends in a private group would be intercepted or detected by British services or third parties beyond the intended recipients.