A couple who assaulted a woman in a row over a missing handbag received fines and suspended sentences this week in Tallaght Court.
Stephen Wosser, aged 20, with an address at Rossfield Crescent and his girlfriend Lisa McLoughlin, aged 19, with an address at Glenshane Drive, Tallaght both pleaded not guilty to assaulting Ms Melissa O’Brien at her house at Sundale Estate in Tallaght on March 20, 2004.
Ms O’Brien told Judge James McDonnell that on the evening of March 19, 2004 she Wosser, MsLoughlin, Mr Stephen Lynch and others had gone back to her house after having drinks in the Belgard Inn.
At 4am, Wosser, McLoughlin and Mr Lynch had left the house but at 10am, Ms O’Brien said they returned looking for McLoughlin’s handbag.
Ms O’Brien said that she told them she did not know where the handbag was. She said McLoughlin then attacked her by pulling her hair and scratching and scraping her. Ms O’Brien said that McLoughlin had threatened to kill her and that Wosser had kicked her on her side.
McLoughlin said that Ms O’Brien had punched her first. She accepted that she had fought back but denied pulling Ms O’Brien’s hair or threatening her.
She said Wosser “never touched” Ms O’Brien. Wosser denied that he had kicked Ms O’Brien. Mr Lynch said that he and Wosser had separated the two women when they started fighting.
Judge McDonnell said that all three parties had been “drunk out of their minds”. He said that he was satisfied that McLoughlin had been “annoyed and enraged” over the missing handbag and that McLoughlin and Wosser had assaulted Ms O’Brien.
He said that McLoughlin and Ms O’Brien had “rolled around the ground like a pair of alley cats.”
Neither of the defendants had a previous conviction.
Judge McDonnell then remanded both in custody to Monday September, 26 for sentencing.
On Friday morning, September, 23, McLoughlin was released on bail after evidence was given that she had a medical appointment.
Judge McDonnell fined Wosser €1000.
On Wednesday September, 28 Ms Malone told Judge McDonnell that McLoughlin did not sleep during her night in custody in Mountjoy and added that the experience had given her “ample food for thought”/
Judge McDonnell fined McLoughlin €500. He added that he had imposed a lesser fine as McLoughlin was unemployed.
He sentenced both McLoughlin and Wosser to three months detention, suspended for five years.