Onich crofter admits assaulting pensioner
A Lochaber crofter attacked an 83-year-old woman because she was going to help his elderly mother take down curtains in her home.
Inverness Sheriff Court was told that 50-year-old Colin Campbell of Cuilcheanna, Onich, dragged the pensioner out onto the patio before punching her on the head and body.
Fiscal depute Martina Eastwood said Campbell shouted at his victim: ‘Don’t be interfering with anything in this house.’
The woman pleaded with Campbell’s 93-year-old parent to phone the police and when officers arrived, Campbell confessed to officers what he had done, Ms Eastwood added.
The prosecutor said Campbell was a crofting tenant who supported his mother and provided maintenance, transport and did shopping for her.
Sheriff Sara Matheson heard that Mrs Campbell had wanted to remove the curtains and her neighbour offered to help.
Campbell told her not to do it but when the woman continued with her task, she was attacked, Ms Eastwood went on.
Campbell admitted assaulting the woman by seizing her by the neck, pushing her against a wall, causing her to fall to the ground and punching her on the head and body to her severe injury and impairment. Ms Eastwood said the woman suffered a broken ulna and required a cast on her arm, a cut lip, a nose fracture and she lost two teeth.
‘She still suffers from restricted mobility,’
Ms Eastwood added. Deferring sentence until Monday February 14 for a background report and a restriction of liberty order assessment, Sheriff Matheson allowed Campbell’s bail to continue. But she warned him: ‘You should take nothing from that,’ implying that a jail sentence was still a possibility.