Location: Barnsley, South Yorkshire
Ben Lindsay is a hunt saboteur who has been charged with assault after allegedly attacking a woman.
Protests and arrests: Ben Lindsay, 34, of Fitzwilliam Street, Barnsley, was charged with two counts of assault by beating after throwing soup over women’s rights activist Kellie-Jay Keen in Sheffield on 21 September.
The incident occurred at a ‘Let Women Speak’ event by Sheffield City Hall, which was attended by crowds of supporters and counter-protestors.
After Keen was doused in Heinz tomato soup, her assailant tried to flee but was chased by Keen’s supporters and eventually caught by police officers.
South Yorkshire Police released a statement later that day saying that Lindsay had been charged with two counts of assault by beating.
Lindsay was filmed handcuffed and being marched away by police officers following his arrest. By this point he had removed his jacket to reveal a hunt saboteur T-shirt and had donned a black balaclava, looking the spitting image of the gangs of masked sabs who roam the countryside during the trail hunting season.
His T-shirt read, “Cull the Rich: Support your local hunt saboteurs”. The top costs £20 to buy online, with the money raised from the sale apparently donated to the Hunt Saboteur Association.
This was the second time Keen had liquid poured on her by a protester, a similar incident having happened in New Zealand in March 2023. Speaking about the incident, she told the MailOnline, “The last time it happened to me, it provoked the mob that had already assembled to level up if you like and I genuinely thought I was going to lose my life that day, which sounds very hyperbolic but completely true. I thought if I hit the floor, I'll never get up. That was the point of what he [Lindsay] was doing with the soup, it's all tied up in intimidating women so we don't feel like we can speak in public.”
Lindsay’s LinkedIn biography claimed he was working at Southampton Solent University “as their first Student Equality & Diversity associate”. He described his job as “to engage with students about their experiences of university and hopefully help to make the campus that little bit more tolerant and friendly for everyone”. We hardly need point out the hypocrisy.
However, it seems Solent University was keen to distance itself from the attacker. It released the following statement: “This individual has not been an employee of Solent University for a number of years. Solent University does not condone any acts of violence.”
Behind The Masks wonders if this is the same Ben Lindsay, described as being 22, a student, of Milton Road, Southampton, who in April 2013 was arrested and charged “with using threatening, abusive, insulting words or behaviour with intent to cause fear of/provoke unlawful violence” during an English Defence League (EDL) protest march in Brighton. The outcome of the case is unknown.
According to South Yorkshire Police, Lindsay has been released on conditional bail and will appear before Sheffield Magistrates’ Court on 25 November.