I had a panic button fitted in home because I feared husband, claims DJ
FORMER CLYDE 1 disc jockey Suzie McGuire had a panic button installed in her home after splitting up with her allegedly violent husband, a court heard yesterday.
Ms McGuire was giving evidence for a second day at Paisley Sheriff Court where estranged husband Derek Mitchell is on trial accused of a number of charges, including assaults and breaches of the peace between March 2009 and October 2013.
Yesterday the 45-year-old denied lying about claims Mitchell assaulted her on two occasions in 2009.
At the end of her questioning by procurator fiscal depute Amanda Gallagher, Ms McGuire told the jury: “The police have actually installed a panic button in the house.”
She added that social services have “prevented” Mitchell from seeing their two children.
Under cross-examination by defence lawyer Billy Lavelle, Ms McGuire said that a fortnight ago she was advised by social services to keep the children at home after they were brought home from a visit with him by the police.
The court heard that the children had a nanny, Caroline McNiven, until she recently changed jobs and that Mitchell contacted her to ask something about one of his children and this led to the police being contacted.
Ms McGuire said she called the police, who collected them from Mitchell, and they were brought home in a police car, “barefoot” and “dirty”.
Mr Lavelle said: “This is just you throwing some more mud
“I was bitten, savaged on the cheek, held up by the throat” Suzie McGuire
at Mr Mitchell when you had the opportunity to do so.”
Ms McGuire described an assault in November 2009 when Mitchell allegedly had her by the throat against furniture in her Eaglesham home and hurled threats at her.
The jury heard police were called but Mitchell had left the property when they arrived and Ms McGuire “played right down” what happened and told them they had a “minor argument”.
She said she spent four years trying to hide the “vicious assaults and torment” she suffered in the house. Mr Lavelle put it to her she phoned police to “get back at Mr Mitchell”.
Ms McGuire replied: “Absolutely not.”
In relation to another alleged assault at a car park in Glasgow city centre, Ms McGuire claims she was grabbed by the throat, lifted up and bitten on the face on Christmas Eve 2009.
Ms McGuire said her mother saw the bitemark on her face. She told the defence lawyer she did not go to hospital after the incident but did contact the police. She admitted she did not give a statement to police but did sign an officer’s pad after telling them she was attacked.
She added: “I was 100 per cent bitten, savaged on the cheek and held up by the throat in Mitchell Street car park.”
The defence lawyer put to her that the court may hear from a police officer that she had “no obvious injuries”. She replied: “I dispute that.”
She denied the suggestion that she and Mitchell had an argument in town because he wanted to go home and she wished to stay, and that her way of dealing with it was to report him to the police.
Mitchell denies the charges and has lodged a special defence of self-defence for one of the assault charges. The trial continues.