Facebook charge after riot posting

West Yorkshire Police detained a 19-year-old woman from Wakefield after an invitation to a “riot” in the city was posted on the web.

Last night she was charged under the Serious Offences Act 2007 and bailed to appear before Wakefield magistrates on August 24.

She was one of a series of suspects arrested across the country as police monitored sites such as Twitter for messages which might incite trouble.

Humberside Deputy Chief Constable David Griffin said: “A feature of the recent disturbances around the country has been the abuse of social networking media by a small minority of mindless individuals attempting to incite trouble by posting messages inviting people to assemble and cause trouble at particular locations.

“Those people should be aware that we are monitoring these sites ... and we will take action against those intent on attempting to incite violence.”

Cheshire Police said eight people in their area aged between 13 and 24 were arrested on suspicion of inciting public disorder through the use of social media sites.

A spokeswoman said: “A number of young people have been spoken to with their parents and advice was given regarding entries on social networking sites, or comments passed via Twitter.”

Lancashire Police said a 28-year-old man from Heysham had been charged with encouraging or assisting the commission of burglary of a store via Facebook and will appear before magistrates in Lancaster on August 19.