Homophobic Cambridgeshire leaflet brings hate crime probe

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-27339240

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Police are looking for "a religious zealot" who distributed homophobic leaflets in Cambridgeshire and may have committed a "hate crime".

Anonymous leaflets saying homosexuality is "unnatural, corrupted, distorted and a sin", have been delivered to addresses in Cambridge and Ely.

Police said they had been contacted by several people upset by the leaflets.

Rev Colin Coward, who works for social inclusion, said they appeared to be the work of "a religious zealot".

A Cambridgeshire police spokesman said: "We have received a number of reports about the leaflets and are treating the matter as a hate incident.

"We are liaising with local and national partners about the leaflets and investigations are ongoing."

The document describes homosexual acts as "contrary to the natural law", the spokesman said.

'Very graphic'

Mr Coward, whose organisation Changing Attitude works for inclusion within the Church of England, was shown the text.

He said the ideas in the leaflet were "taking what's in the bible to an extreme and adding their own poisonous prejudice against lesbian and gay people. It's really toxic and nasty.

"Anybody who writes that kind of material is clearly a religious zealot."

Malcolm Green, who received a leaflet, told the BBC: "Having read the first few lines I wanted to see which religious organisation or other organisation was sending this out but there was absolutely no accreditation on it whatsoever.

"There was no way of getting back to the people with our views on their views."

Ely's mayor, Elaine Griffin-Singh, whose sister received a leaflet, said: "It's very graphic in its nature and must fall into the realms of unacceptable."