Football fan banned over gender-critical posts after ‘Stasi’ Premier League investigation

Linzi Smith said what happened was ‘sinister, and I feel violated’ – Mark Pinder

A female football fan was banned from matches over social media posts that were deemed transphobic after a “Stasi” spying investigation by the Premier League.

A special unit set up to root out racism in the game was used to comb through comments made by Linzi Smith, a gender-critical Newcastle United supporter, even though the posts had nothing to do with football. Gender-critical people believe transgender women are not women.

Ms Smith, who is gay and promotes lesbian, gay and bisexual rights and women’s rights, was put under investigation by the police, the Premier League and Newcastle United after expressing strong views on trans ideology on her personal account on X, formerly Twitter.

The 34-year-old was shocked to discover that the Premier League had compiled a dossier detailing where she lives, works and where she walked her dog. The 11-page “target profile”, marked confidential, included data on “associated aliases” and “vulnerabilities”.

She was interviewed under caution by police after the dossier was handed to officers by Newcastle United. Officers took just two hours to inform her that she had not committed any crime, but the club, which had spent four months looking into her background, revoked her membership and banned her from games until 2026.

She is taking legal action in an attempt to overturn the ban, arguing that her right to exercise gender-critical views is protected in law, and that the Premier League’s trawl of her personal social media account constituted a breach of data protection laws.

The cover of the 11-page dossier

She told The Telegraph: “I’m struggling to believe this has happened to me. It’s mind-blowing that they have gone to such lengths because I have expressed views to which I am entitled on my personal Twitter account.

“They have behaved like the Stasi – it was being done so covertly that I didn’t even know what was happening.

“They kept telling me they want everyone to feel included – but it appears you’re only welcome if you follow their thought process on everything, and if you don’t you are banned. It is sinister and I feel violated, to be honest.”

Newcastle United began prying into the personal life of Ms Smith, who lives in Newcastle and runs a tea shop with her mother, after receiving a complaint from a fan who said they supported LGBTQ+ organisations and accused her of discrimination against trans people.

The complainant included screenshots of tweets Ms Smith had posted in which she suggested the trans lobby was homophobic because it wanted to “trans the gay away”, and that some transgender people were suffering from mental illness.

The complainant said: “If I were trans, I would feel extremely unsafe… had I had to share a space with someone so openly transphobic… Many of her tweets revolve around the ‘LGB’ movement, a trans-exclusionary and discriminatory movement for members of the lesbian, gay and bisexual community to deliberately exclude and aim to discourage/discriminate/target the transgender community.”

The complainant said Ms Smith’s tweets “make a mockery of the trans movement” and told the club that she had been “engaging in conversation with a prominent ‘Terf’: a trans-exclusionary radical feminist”.

Part of the dossier compiled on Newcastle supporter Linzi Smith

In October, Newcastle United contacted Ms Smith via email, saying she was “currently under investigation by Northumbria Police for a possible hate crime offence” and that her membership had been suspended.

“I felt sick to my stomach,” she said. “I just thought, this can’t be right. I had no idea what it was referring to.”

At no point was there any suggestion that she had done anything to offend anyone during a match, inside the stadium or in any circumstance that involved the football club, but within hours its equality and inclusion team had leapt into action.

Internal emails discussing her case – which she obtained by submitting a subject access request to the club – detailed a four-month investigation that culminated in her being banned.

“When I go to a football match, I just talk about football,” said Ms Smith. “But I have been banned because the club thinks just having to sit near me is bad – someone you disagree with.”

Days after she received the email, two police officers came to her home wanting to interview her. She refused to let them in, but when they said they had grounds to arrest her she agreed to attend a police station the next day. There, she was interviewed under caution about her tweets for 25 minutes.

“I felt quite dizzy and sick afterwards,” she said. “I was shaking. I had to sit in my car for about 20 minutes before I could drive.”

Two hours later, she received a phone confirming that police would be taking no further action because she had not committed any offence.

‘Just seemed surreal’

In mid-November, she received a letter from Newcastle United telling her she was banned from the club’s St James’ Park stadium for the rest of this season and the two seasons after that, and that her membership had been revoked. She was also banned from buying tickets for away games.

“I just cried,” she said. “I plan my whole weekends around football, I’ve been a Newcastle fan my whole life and I’ve spent thousands over the years on tickets, shirts, everything. What was happening just seemed surreal.”

The club said she had breached the equality and diversity section of its membership rules, which state that the club will protect supporters from discrimination, harassment and victimisation.

It said she had also breached its equality policy, which is similarly worded, and section 12 of its ground regulations, which prohibit “any conduct, act or statement… that is discriminatory”, including by means of gender or sexual orientation.

One of the examples Newcastle gave in reaching the decision was a tweet in which Ms Smith said: “It’s like they’re trying to trans the gay away. You’re a young woman who likes sport? YOU’VE BEEN BORN IN THE WRONG BODY!!!! You’re a young man who likes makeup and dressing up??? YOU’VE BEEN BORN IN THE WRONG BODY!!!! Make it make sense.”

Through a friend, she was put in touch with Harry Miller, a former police officer who won a legal challenge against police forces recording gender-critical views as hate incidents.

He urged her to submit a subject access request to Newcastle United. When the club sent her the documentation it held on her, she found it included an 11-page dossier compiled by the Premier League, entitled Online Investigation and Target Profile – Linzi Smith.

The Premier League’s investigation unit, which does not have an official name, is part of its legal department and based at its headquarters in Paddington, west London. It was set up in 2019 to monitor abuse, in particular racist abuse, directed at players.

The Premier League had trawled through Linzi Smith’s social media posts to find her date of birth

The Premier League had trawled through her social media posts to find her date of birth, where she lives, the area where she works, and discover that “they do appear to walk their dog by [XXXX] Church which is just off [the street where she lives].”

The intelligence was accompanied by a picture Ms Smith had posted on social media of her dog, Chester, which has since died, being walked near the church, and two screenshots of the church and its environs from Google Street View.

Under a section titled “vulnerabilities”, the report noted that Ms Smith had repeatedly been a victim of online abuse, including her face having been superimposed onto an image of someone being hanged.

“I’m still struggling to believe this has happened,” she said. “I find it quite frightening, because I wasn’t aware of what they were doing without my knowledge, and it was only because I submitted a subject access request to the club that I discovered what they had been up to. I feel violated.”

She was also sent 33 pages of emails setting out how the club came to its decision.

On July 23 last year an email was sent from Newcastle United to an unknown email address – thought to be the Premier League – saying: “Would you be interested in researching this one for us please.”

Two days later, the Premier League had completed its confidential Online Investigation and Target Profile on Ms Smith.

The Free Speech Union, which campaigns for freedom of speech and helps people to defend their rights in court, believes the case is not an isolated one and has set up an online tool to make it easy for people to submit subject access requests.

Toby Young, the general secretary of the Free Speech Union, said: “This is the most egregious example of corporate interference with free speech I’ve ever come across. In effect, the social media accounts of football fans are being monitored by the ‘Stadium Stasi’. It’s like something out of 1984.”

The organisation is helping Ms Smith to fight her ban by appealing to the Independent Football Ombudsman, and she is also considering taking legal action under equalities legislation.

She has made a complaint to the Independent Office for Police Conduct and has written to the Information Commissioner’s Office, alleging that the Premier League and Newcastle United have breached data protection laws.

Linzi Smith said she still supported Newcastle United and hoped to return to St James’ Park – Mark Pinder

Ms Smith appealed against her ban using the club’s appeals process, but was told on Jan 26 that it had been upheld because her tweets “constitute harassment as set out in the club’s Equality Policy”.

She said she still supported Newcastle United and hoped to return to St James’ Park, but would not do so while the people responsible for her ban were still employed by the club.

She added that she was “jumpy” every time her doorbell rang and avoided going into Newcastle city centre, adding: “People on social media have said things like wishing I’d get glassed in the pub, or wishing that I was in Gaza. I don’t feel safe now.”

“It seems that the real danger in this country is not knife crime, it’s words,” she said. “These people have got the power to take away your passion in life, all because they don’t like what you are saying. Football matches are where you go to forget about politics, but they seem dead set on bringing it all in, don’t they?”

The Premier League declined to comment. Newcastle United were approached for comment

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