This woman was fined $8,500 for posting a selfie to Instagram
Oct 29, 2020
Dunja Đuđić
Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, concerts, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.
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Well, it looks like we’ve reached the stage of 2020 when sharing a selfie could end up in getting arrested or paying a massive fine. A UK photographer recently posted a selfie which proved that she had broken the self-isolation order. Consequently, she was ordered to pay £6,600 (around $8,530) after sharing the photo on Instagram.
A photography student who shall remain unnamed flew from Manchester to her home in Jersey on 12 October. Since Manchester was one of the worst infected areas, she was supposed to self-isolate for five days, after which she’d do a coronavirus test. According to the New York Post, contact tracers told the photographer that she had been in contact with an infected traveler on her flight from Manchester. So, she was obliged to self-isolate for a bit longer and take another test on the eighth day of her visit.
However, it looks like the young photographer didn’t have time to waste at home. According to multiple sources, the photographer went shopping, to a restaurant, and a friend’s house. Metro writes that she was at the El Tico restaurant in St Ouen’s Bay, where she took a selfie and shared it on Instagram. Obviously, it was solid proof that she wasn’t respecting self-isolation. The same source writes that she had two options: paying the £6,600 fine or going to prison for six months. The photographer reportedly chose the first option and paid the fine.
This case reminded me of that time when a dude stole a phone and posted a selfie to the victim’s Instagram. Or those guys who got arrested after posting a selfie with a stolen car. But if anyone told me this time last year that sharing a selfie from a restaurant could send you to jail or land you a fine, I would have said that they were crazy. Sure, I disapprove that the photographer didn’t respect the isolation rule and possibly risked others’ health. But when you think about it, it’s pretty sad that we’ve reached the stage when going shopping, visiting a friend or going out has become illegal.
Editor’s note: the lead image is for illustration purposes only.
[via FStoppers]
Dunja Đuđić
Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, concerts, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.
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37 responses to “This woman was fined $8,500 for posting a selfie to Instagram”
Good
What’s with the clickbait headline? She was fined after posting it, not because she posted it
Yes and she was fined because she posted proof, the post is what got her convicted
The headline implies she was fined for the selfie, not for violating the isolation rule
You inferred that. That’s on you. It was as a consequence of posting it. If she hadn’t posted it, nobody would have ever known and she would have been fine, not fined. :)
But her crime wasn’t posting the picture. It was breaking quarantine. The headline implies that taking a self portrait was her crime.
But you read past the headline, where it was clarified. :)
Only with the expectation that the headline was going to be misleading.
If you have to read past the headline to get clarification, it’s a very poorly written headline.
Yes, we should just have thousand word headlines. Then nobody would ever need to look beyond them, right? :)
I think if the headline was worded “after posting a selfie” rather than “for posting a selfie” it would make more sense. The headline very much implies, as there’s no other context, that the fine was for posting a selfie.
She had already been spotted before posting the selfie and also the track and trace team were already trying to contact her but failing. So while the Instagram post was important evidence it’s not true to say she was only convicted due to the post.
This seems confusing. If, as an example, I steal a car, smash it through a jewelry shop window, grab the swag and then stand in front of said car and shop sporting handfuls of stolen goods and take a selfie, will you also defend a headline that says ‘Man sent to prison for for five years for taking selfie.’?
Or better yet, is she had been a decent and thoughtful human being instead of a selfish piece of sh** then she wouldn’t have gone out and violated the order to begin with.
Actually breaking the order to begin with is what got her convicted, if she had never broken the order she could not have been convicted.
Oh dear. She will be smarter next time.
Never thought I’d live in an age where people complained it wasn’t enough of a police state
When you are stupid enough to post evidence against yourself publicly on the internet, is it really a police state, or is it more that you are a moron? If you robbed a bank, would you post videos of you doing it on YouTube and when you got arrested blame it on a “police state”.
can she keep the mugshot?
This is exactly whats wrong with everyone! They think the rules don’t apply to them!
The headline is misleading.
She wasn’t fined “for” posting a selfie to Instagram.
Can you say “clickbait?”
Yabut, how many likes did she get? Did her virus go viral?? Viralus?? Did they hit the bell & subscribe!! Wait, that’s Youtube…
Interesting to notice the manipulative subtext here: that her mistake was to leave evidence, rather than the whole “putting people around her at risk” thing.
This wasn’t a little slip, this was gross negligence.
That headline is 100% clickbait. Better headlines should read:
“Woman puts public’s health in danger!”
“Woman decides her coffee more important than your health”
“Sick woman buys coffee, potentially killing the barista”
Here the news so you don’t have to fall for clickbait
“Well, it looks like we’ve reached the stage of 2020 when sharing a selfie could end up in getting arrested or paying a massive fine. A UK photographer recently posted a selfie which proved that she had broken the self-isolation order. Consequently, she was ordered to pay £6,600 (around $8,530) after sharing the photo on Instagram.”
No law was broken so how can one be penalized for violating a guideline? Nothing but a govt money grab.
UK law was changed at the end of September so that failing to isolate after being instructed to by a public health officer is now a criminal offence. This wasn’t the case when the Covid laws were introduced – like you said they were always guidelines.
“Ingram pleaded guilty to two counts of breaching self-isolation and opted to pay the fine rather than six months’ jail, the report said.”
Bullshit.
Executive orders, and governor mandates are actually law, so if she was violating a self-isolation order she was indeed breaking the law. You need to go back to, oh I don’t know, kindergarten and learn to read and find out what is and isn’t a law, since doing a quick google search is way beyond your skill level.
Can we please get back to DIY photo projects?
I would rephrase that end remark. It’s not illegal. She potentially put a lot of people’s lives in danger and could have started a new spread. We all have these enforcements in place to help stop the virus. But obviously some people think these procedures don’t apply to them. I’m sure the jail time and fine is more of a deterrent towards others who would have tried the same thing, rather than anything else.
As a person who have multiple elderly relatives with underlying issues, I’m hyper aware of everything that goes on around them. They lived long lived, went through a lot of world life events and don’t deserve to die from a virus that some girl spread because she didn’t want to sit at home for just over a week.
“But when you think about it, it’s pretty sad that we’ve reached the stage when going shopping, visiting a friend or going out has become illegal.”
None of those things are illegal. What’s illegal is if you’re told to self-isolate by the NHS Test and Trace and then fail to do so (which is what happened here). It was passed in to UK law on the 28th September.
“I disapprove that Ingram didn’t respect the isolation rule”
It’s not a rule, it’s a law.
I would too…that delft $UCKS A$$!!!
When you think about it, it’s pretty sad that your shopping or visiting a friend, or being a decent human being is more important to you than spreading a a disease that can kill people who had no choice in the matter because of your selfishness. Also, she was committing a crime, aka breaking the law, and posted evidence of it against herself. Seems that stupid is as stupid does. Also, you are sad writer.
Yeah, so sharing a selfie to social media that proves you’re committing a crime might then get you prosecuted for that crime… that’s fair. Obviously it’s already wrong to be breaking the self-isolation order, but ffs how stupid or ignorant do you have to be to then publicise it!!
She was fined for posting evidence of her breaking the law by posting a selfie on IG …. how selfish and stupid can you get
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