Comic Lee Hurst: I smashed mobile phone to protect my gags

Fined: Lee Hurst said jokes were stolen and sold to BBC
Paul Cheston13 April 2012

Stand-up comedian Lee Hurst today admitted smashing up a mobile phone owned by a member of the audience he thought was stealing his material.

Hurst, 46, grabbed the handset and threw it to the floor when he believed it was being used to film part of his routine at the Stoke pub in Guildford.

He told Guildford magistrates' court he had lashed out because footage of his gigs had turned up on websites such as YouTube.

He also accused writers of recording his material so they could sell his jokes to television shows.

The former star of TV quiz They Think It's All Over was fined £60 and ordered to pay compensation of £80 and £87 costs after admitting criminal damage.

Prosecutor Liz Highams told the court that Hurst interrupted his show last September to enter the audience and snatch the £80 Motorola K1 phone from Gareth Hughes.

Mr Hughes said he had been sending a text but Hurst, defending himself, said he refused to believe him.

The comedian told the court he had almost finished his 30-minute set when he saw Mr Hughes with the phone in front of his face and a bright light shining from it which followed him as he moved across the stage.

"TV programmes have writers to write for performers and I have had gags stolen and sold to the BBC and ITV and then that material is gone," he said.

"You are then accused of stealing your own material from a comic on national television. There are thieves amongst the circuit and thieves amongst the writers. There is nobody to protect us, we have to protect ourselves."

So he grabbed the phone, but he added: "I have no knowledge of how to delete the material, so in anger I smashed it.

"I've since been told this would not have removed the footage. Police at Guildford told me forensic scientists could have pulled it back out of there."

Hurst, of Limehouse, initially denied being in the pub at the time but claimed this was because the date on the charge was incorrect.

When asked about this he replied: "Would you charge someone with 9/11 if it happened on 9/12?

"If I said I was guilty, I would have been lying, I didn't come here to lie."

Sentencing the comedian, presiding magistrate Jon Curtis said: "Whilst we have some sympathy with the situation you find yourself in, that is no excuse for causing criminal damage."

Speaking outside the court, Hurst called for stand-up performers to be protected by the same copyright laws as in the cinema.

Asked if he regretted what he had done, he said: "I would defend myself in the way that my father taught me - and I would ban YouTube, it is the biggest packet of c**p ever."

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