'We’re cutting you up': Traveller women jailed for knife attack on Limerick grandmother

David Raleigh

Three Traveller women wept in Limerick Circuit Criminal Court as they were jailed for knifing a grandmother in the face and beating her with sticks.

Christina McCarthy, nee Harty, (61), was left with permanent facial scarring after being set upon by the group of women in the bedroom of her home, at Rathkeale, Co Limerick, on December 10th, 2019.

McCarthy eventually escaped the women’s clutches by crawling underneath her bed.

“I can still see their faces, and hear myself roaring for mercy to let me go. I don’t know how I survived it. They wanted me dead,” said McCarthy.

The mob of women included mother and daughter, Nora “Josie” Harty, (58), and Mary Ellen Daly, (35), both of Lisheen Park, Patrickswell, who were each jailed for three and half years with the final year suspended, after they pleaded guilty to assaulting McCarthy causing her harm while being in possession of knives.

The court heard that Nora Harty is a first cousin of the victim.

Christina Casey, (48), of St Aidan’s Close, Brookfield, Tallaght, Dublin, who pleaded guilty to violent disorder while in possession of a baseball bat, was jailed for 28 months with the final ten months suspended.

Rita Johnson (51), of St Ita’s Street, St Mary’s Park, Limerick City, who pleaded guilty to trespassing at the victim’s home, agreed to complete 120 hours of community service in lieu of a six-month jail sentence.

Outlining the facts, prosecuting barrister, Lily Buckley, instructed by state solicitor for County Limerick, Brendan Gill, said that McCarthy and her daughter were involved in an altercation with Mary Ellen Daly and another woman outside a shopping centre a day before the attack, and there was an earlier alleged incident on board a “party bus”.

Buckley said that, on the day of the attack, McCarthy was asleep in her bed when she “opened her eyes” and she saw a number of women “coming for her”, including Daly, Harty, and Casey.

Buckley said Harty told McCarthy: “We’re not letting you go, we’re cutting you up, we’re killing you.”

Buckley said Daly also told the victim: “I'm cutting you up. I’m killing you.”

McCarthy told gardaí she thought she was going to die as Harty and Daly slashed her face.

Buckley said: “She (McCarthy) said she remembers them slashing at her face and she said Ms Daly caught her by the hair like a rag doll.”

McCarthy also suffered slash wounds to her hands as she held them up to “protect herself”.

Buckley said other women were hitting the victim with sticks, but that McCarthy told gardaí this was a bit of a “blur” in her memory: “She said she crawled under the bed to save herself.”

The four defendants were observed by an independent witness leaving McCarthy’s home, who also told gardaí they saw 20 people, angry and screaming, running from the victim’s home.

McCarthy was treated at University Hospital Limerick for slash wounds to her face, a thumb, and an index finger, and she also underwent a number of surgeries.

In her victim impact statement, McCarthy said: “My face and hands were destroyed, affecting how I look, I will never be the same in my face, and the pain never goes away from my hand.”

McCarthy said she continues to suffer with anxiety, panic attacks and is constantly looking over her shoulder “waiting to be attacked again”.

Harty, Daly, Casey, and Johnson all denied being at McCarthy’s home on the day of the attack.

Photos of McCarthy’s injuries, damage to a broken window and door at her home, and blood and hair at the scene, were shown to the court.

Defence barristers Liam Carroll, for Harty; Grace Hogan, for Daly; Joseph McMahon, for Casey; and Johanna O’Connor, for Rita Johnson, told the court their clients were remorseful and apologetic and provided positive reports in respect of the accused women, which were prepared by the Probation Service and Tipperary Rural Travellers Project.

The four barristers asked sentencing judge, Fiona O’Sullivan, to impose community service orders on all four accused in lieu of custodial sentences.

Judge O’Sullivan described the attack on McCarthy as a “terrifying ordeal”. The judge said the attack took place in McCarthy’s bedroom, where she had the right to feel secure and safe.