Fulham FC fan in California sues over 'racist' number plate row

Jonathan Kotler with Billy the Badger, Fulham FC's mascot, outside Craven Cottage stadium in west London

 A Fulham FC fan living in California is suing a state office after he was prohibited from having the letters COYW on a customized vehicle number plate, as they dreaded the trademark "Please you whites" had supremacist meanings. 

College teacher Jonathan Kotler said he was "stunned" at the choice.

Propelling his lawful case, he guaranteed the choice by the California Division of Engine Vehicles abused his entitlement to the right to speak freely.

"It's only a shirt shading," he said.

"The general population at the DMV are either additional thick or very PC."

Prof Kotler connected for a plate that would peruse Bashful W - a shortened form of the motto ordinarily utilized by Fulham football fans - and a hashtag seen each end of the week on many Twitter posts about the club.

The 73-year-old, who was conceived in New Jersey and now lives in Calabasas, California, has been an enthusiast of Fulham FC for a considerable length of time, subsequent to watching a match "by happenchance" amid a visit to London.

He was initially an aficionado of both Manchester Joined together and Fulham, yet picked his present devotion in 2006 when the two groups were in the Head Alliance.

Prof Kotler's plate currently reads FFC SW6 for the club's initials and stadium postcode

Prof Kotler, who shows media law at the College of Southern California, put in his application for the number plate a year ago and needed to incorporate the purposes behind his selection of letters, yet it was turned down.

The Branch of Engine Vehicles said the COYW trademark could be viewed as unfriendly, annoying, or racially corrupting, as per the US government legitimate case.

"I sent them huge amounts of material," Prof Kotler told the BBC. "Official statements, stories from the English media, letters from the administrator who utilizes 'please you whites'.

"I called attention to that numerous clubs in England are known by their shading - the blues, the clarets. No one idea the Liverpool reds were socialists."

He included: "Notwithstanding when I did it, it was the uttermost thing from my mind that anybody would item to it. I was stunned, completely."

'This is insane' 

He said the club's proprietor, Shahid Khan, "utilizes the expression constantly".

"Half of the group are non-white. Furthermore, it's only a shirt shading. It has nothing to do with something besides that.

"I concluded this is insane, this is sufficient. I can take it to a certain degree yet this wound up close to home."

Prof Kotler said he goes to watch Fulham play in England by and large around eight to multiple times a season, regularly taking the 11-hour trip on a Thursday and returning back in the US by Tuesday prepared to show his understudies.

In his lawful grumbling, he is requesting that the court proclaim the DMV's criteria for customized tags illegal. He asserts he has been denied of his entitlement to the right to speak freely.

The Division of Engine Vehicles says it doesn't remark on pending legitimate cases.