Drunk girl took part in 'appalling' group attack

A teenage girl, who was drunk on a litre of vodka, repeatedly kicked a man in the stomach while he lay on the ground and was simultaneously attacked by four others, a court heard today.

The girl (aged 17) had pleaded not guilty to assaulting a 23-year-old American man, at Dublin’s Aston Quay, on March 13 last. She was found guilty at her hearing in the Dublin Children’s Court today where Judge Bryan Smyth described the gang attack as “quite appalling.”

The victim said that he had been robbed on Westmoreland Street by three men who had taken his wallet. He followed to ask for his property back when he was struck from behind and set on by the men at which point the girl joined in the attack.

“I was punched and kicked by the group of five or six, she was one of the ones involved in the kicking and punching I was on the ground most of the time,” he told the court.

“I tried to fight back but there was really nothing I could do,” he said adding that he thought the girl kicked him in the stomach six times and then went through his pockets.

Eventually the girl and the group of attackers left him at which he got help from a taxi driver.

The taxi driver said he saw the girl and another sharing out the contents of a wallet and when the victim approached him his face had been covered in blood.

Defence counsel Mr David Dodd told Judge Smyth that his client had no defence to enter.

He had been instructed by her that she had drunk “a litre of vodka and does not remember what happened.”

However the girl had instructed him that if she was one of the attackers “she would feel very sorry for him.”

The girl had six previous convictions mostly for public order violations.

In mitigation Mr Dodd said the girl, who was accompanied to court by her father, was on a training course and none of her siblings had been in trouble. He said she came before the court without a serious criminal history and he appealed for a sanction other than custody.

Judge Smyth said that in the past the girl had been given community service and a fine but she was now limiting the court’s option in terms of sentencing.

“People should be able to go about their business without having to suffer such an assault,” he said.

“She was part of a group, what happened was unacceptable and quiet appalling in fact,” he added.

He remanded her on bail to appear again next month to allow a report to be obtained from the Probation Services however he warned that “she was certainly looking at a sentence.”