THE father of Celtic super fan Jay Beatty has described how he has met an online troll who abused his son online.
Martin Beatty came face-to-face with a Scottish teenager who posted abusive comments about his 11-year-old son.
Mr Beatty said the family have been left "heartbroken" by the disturbing online messages, but "thankfully Jay is unaware".
Jay has made hailed as a Celtic super fan due to his devotion to the Scottish club and its former striker Georgios Samaras, who famously embraced him after a match.
But the Lurgan schoolboy has become the target of online trolls, including one Scottish teenager who sent messages on Facebook.
Scottish police launched an investigation after Mr Beatty was copied into Facebook conversations containing derogatory comments about Jay's disability and threats to his safety.
The teenager was arrested and referred to take part in a restorative justice programme in Scotland.
After taking part in the programme, he expressed remorse for his actions and said he wanted to apologise to Jay's family.
Mr Beatty said he had a two hour meeting with the teenager and explained how he had hurt his family.
Jay was brought into meet the teenager towards the end of the meeting, but was unaware of the meeting's purpose.
"Jay was brought into the meeting and actually walked straight towards the young fella who had made the comments about him and gave him a hug and told him that he loved his hair," he told UTV.
"It was pretty powerful."
Mr Beatty said the teenager apologised for his actions.
"I did forgive him, I wished him all the best, I told him 'you've got another chance'. He agreed it was a big mistake".
Mr Beatty also appealed for those responsible for posting abusive messages online to think about the consequences of their actions.
"You just cannot believe that someone has sat down to write that about your son, it just defies belief," he said.
"I would ask people to stop it, before you sit down to write something about someone, I would ask you just to have a little think about it and stop it."
