A KINSALE woman who was assaulted by her neighbour is suffering from post traumatic stress resulting in panic attacks, a counsellor told a court. The victim is afraid to go into enclosed spaces, to queue in banks or to walk narrow streets for fear of meeting her attacker, the counsellor said.
Frances and Thomas Dunne of Cork Street, Kinsale are appealing in the High Court in Cork a Circuit Court award of £21,000 damages to Ms Pauline McCarthy for injuries she received in an assault on the street outside her home on April 24th, 1994.
Mr John Wilcox, a psychologist said when Ms McCarthy attended him a month after the assault she described herself as "being vacuumed of emotion". She was suffering from post traumatic stress and her ability to cope varied depending on different encounters with her neighbours. She had an overpowering need to escape.
He said there had to be some form, of guarantee she would not be verbally abused or intimidated by the Dunnes. "The biggest problem is that they both continue to live next door to each other," said Mr Wilcox.
Mr John McCarthy said he saw Frances Dunne with her left hand on top of his wife's head, gripping firmly on her hair and viciously punching her in the face. There were bunches of hair all over the footpath.
Mr McCarthy said Thomas Dunne jnr had said to Ms McCarthy: "I am going to kill you" and his father had sworn at her. He said he leaned over his wife and forced Ms Dunne to release her grip and he helped her into the house. As he did so Dunne jnr said: "I am going to kill you now" and he ran towards his home.
Mr McCarthy said he went to the street to go to the Garda station to report what happened and Dunne jnr "made a run for me with a clawhammer". "He was raising it in the air and he said `I am going to f. . . ing kill you now'. I said `stop, you cannot do this, I am going for the guards' and he said `F... the guards, I am going to kill you'. Mr McCarthy said he ran back into his home and Dunne followed him, hitting the door with the clawhammer.
He told his counsel, Mr Edward Gleeson, his wife was a totally different person since the assault. Her confidence had gone and any improvement in her condition would be slow.
Frances Dunne said her son stood on the garden wall and told Mrs McCarthy he wanted to speak to her husband. She heard Mrs McCarthy tell Thomas to "go back to England you English knacker".
"I asked her why she was calling my son a knacker. She put up her hand and I thought she was going to strike me. I slapped her in the face and said `do not call my children knackers'. We slipped into the gully outside the door and she hit her head and face on the boot of a parked car.
"She was crying for her husband Johnny and we sort of got up. Mr McCarthy came out the door and punched me on the right shoulder asking me, `what are you doing to my wife?' He took her inside," said Mrs Dunne.
She was sorry she hit Mrs Mc Carthy but she should not have called her son a knacker. She was Jewish and proud of it but her children were brought up in the Catholic church, although her husband was not a practising Catholic. She denied he called Mrs McCarthy a Catholic bastard.
Thomas Dunne snr denied that he was involved in any way in the fracas and he said he did not see a struggle between his wife and Mrs McCarthy. He asked his son what was happening and when he heard there was a scuffle between the two women, he told him to come inside and not disgrace them. He too denied calling his neighbour a Catholic bastard.
Mr Justice Barr reserved his judgment to today.