Racist email sent after bombings

A man has been fined £400 after a court heard he sent a racist email to a Muslim charity just three weeks after the London bombings.

Darren Paul Eastham, 43, of Hadden Street, Coventry, admitted sending the email to the Birmingham-based Islamic Relief Organisation to cause distress.

Mr Wykham Garcia, defending, said Eastham was not a racist and his actions were out of character.

Eastham was told to pay £55 costs at Birmingham Magistrates' Court.

Andrew Crump, prosecuting, said Eastham, who works for a firm that develops police body armour, sent the email, on 27 July.

He said the administrator at the charity received the email and passed it on to the police.

They took until the New Year to track him down and he was arrested on 8 January.

"The Muslim community were at a heightened state of distress after the London bombings and this email was sent shortly afterwards," he said.

In the email, Eastham said members of the Pakistani community should be killed.