Female student stabbed and sexually assaulted

A YOUNG woman was sexually assaulted and stabbed several times in her own home in what gardaí believe was an unprovoked attack.

The woman, a student in her 20s, was injured in the terrifying incident at around 9am at Maine Street in Tralee, Co. Kerry, yesterday morning.

She sustained several slash and stab wounds during the ordeal but managed to fight off her attacker and raise the alarm.

The man suspected of being responsible for the assault has since been arrested and is believed to be from Cork.

Gardaí were last night waiting to interview the victim.

Officers suspect the man broke into her home where he then set about sexually assaulting her.

Sources have told the Mail that the woman will receive specialist medical care at a Sexual Assault Treatment Unit. Detectives believe the two people are not known to each another, so this may have been a random attack.

A source explained: ‘As with any investigation, there are certain things that gardaí are trying to establish, the main one being the motive behind this. Right now, as I’m talking to you, there seems to be no concrete link between this poor woman and the man who has been arrested.

‘What appears to have happened is the man managed to break his way into the apartment and went straight to attack the woman. He sexually assaulted her in her own home and stabbed her with a sharp instrument. It now looks like he also injured himself while he was attacking her and lost quite a bit of blood.’

Several Garda units made their way to Maine Street in Tralee.

Another source said: ‘It was only a matter of minutes after the Garda were informed of what happened that they were actually there on the scene.

‘They also observed some small pooling of blood which they were then able to track. He was arrested a short time after that.’

The arrested man is understood to have come to Garda attention for public order incidents days before the attack happened.

A Garda spokesman said yesterday: ‘Gardaí are currently at the scene of an ongoing incident that occurred at a residential property on Maine Street, Tralee, this morning. At approximately 9.30am, emergency services alerted gardaí of an alleged assault of a woman. The woman, aged in her 20s, has been taken to University Hospital Kerry.’

The spokesman added: ‘One male has since been arrested and is currently detained under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act, 1984, at a Garda station in the Kerry division.’