quote: News Article

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AN Australian woman charged with assault after trying to shush an American moviegoer who was on a mobile phone has been fined $176.

Pauline Clayton was in Texas on holidays when she decided to catch Australian actor Heath Ledger's movie Brokeback Mountain last week.
Halfway through the picture, a woman film patron took a mobile phone call, and began talking.

Annoyed by the disruption, Ms Clayton, a former Sunshine Coast councillor, put her finger to her mouth, signalling to the woman to shush, then touched her on the shoulder twice.

The other woman then stood up and started shouting expletives at Ms Clayton before storming out of the cinema.

Police arrived and escorted Ms Clayton out of the theatre.

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The maligned woman told officers Ms Clayton had been "invading her private space" and accused the Australian of assault.
Police subsequently arrested Ms Clayton and charged her with assault.

Ms Clayton was fined $176, the Seven Network reported today.

Seven showed vision of a smiling Ms Clayton leaving what appeared to be a court building but it was unclear whether she had paid the fine.

"If I don't have a traffic violation or touch anyone again in 90 days, there's no conviction," she said.

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I recently witnessed a similar experience, except the person making the scene was the ‘annoyed’ patron directed at the offending one “…… so yous better shut the f**k up” - to which the audience immediately applauded having endured the annoyance..

People who deliberately use mobile phones (cell phones) in the cinema, or cause any other unreasonable distraction should be shunned!
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 02-15-2006, 11:44 PM:
 
Jeez, if you're going to get charged with assault for shushing a cellphone user and touching them on the shoulder, then you might as well make the assault charge worth it and really beat the leaving shit out of the phone user.


Maybe the phone user should be punished with his phone's own "anti-theft deterrent," as demonstrated in a SuperBowl commercial: take the phone and bean the offender with it repeatedly!


I nominate that phone user for an Asshole of the Year award.
 

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Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 02-15-2006, 11:45 PM:
 
Indeed! Sometimes theatre disturbances are far more entertaining than whats running on the screen .

Mark
 

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Posted by Mike Olpin (Member # 1115) on 02-16-2006, 12:46 AM:
 
Already being discussed over here
 

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