Man given jail time for tweeting racist abuse at USMNT midfielder Maurice Edu | SIDELINE

Maurice Edu

US national team and Stoke City midfielder Maurice Edu was back in the headlines on Wednesday, but it had nothing to do with what he's doing on the field.


Instead, it's got everything to do with one Scottish man's indefensible, racist usage of Twitter almost two years ago to the day.


On January 14, 2012, following a game between Edu's then-club Rangers and St. Johnstone, 43-year-old Michael Convery took to the social media website where he proceded to hurl racially charged insults at Edu and then-Rangers teammate Kyle Bartley.


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According to courtroom testimony, he used a pair of racial epithets in speaking to either one of or both of the players on that day. Edu and Bartley told the court in Glasgow that they had felt "intimidated" and "shocked" by Convery's comments.


Convery then, unsuccessfully, tried to pin the blame for the tweets on his 16-year-old son, but that attempt to wiggle his way out of trouble was thwarted when the court learned the father had Google searched "how to delete Twitter" just hours after the tweets in question were posted.


On Wednesday, Convery was sentenced to six months in jail.