Jacqueline Woodhouse jailed for racist rant on Tube

A drunk passenger who hurled racist abuse at fellow Tube travellers has been jailed for 21 weeks.

Jacqueline Woodhouse, 42, launched an expletive-laden rant at passengers on the Central line, telling those seated near her: "I used to live in England and now I live in the United Nations."

A seven-minute video of the verbal assault recorded by a fellow passenger was uploaded to YouTube and viewed more than 200,000 times.

Woodhouse, of Romford in Essex, admitted causing harassment, alarm and distress earlier this month. Sentencing her at Westminster magistrates' court yesterday, district judge Michael Snow said: "Anyone viewing it would feel a deep sense of shame that our citizens could be subject to such behaviour who may, as a consequence, believe that it secretly represents the views of other white people."

The judge told Woodhouse she would serve half her prison term behind bars and banned her from using the London Underground or Docklands Light Railway while drunk for a five-year period.

On the evening of 23 January, the judge said, Woodhouse drunkenly boarded the Tube at about 11pm.

"The train was packed with people from a variety of ethnic backgrounds," he added. Her rant took place between St Paul's and Mile End stations. "She became loud, foul-mouthed and aggressive."

Woodhouse was fined following a similar offence in December 2008.