The acting principal of a school where it is claimed a girl was repeatedly bullied by fellow pupils told the High Court yesterday they had no evidence the child was attacked in the school yard or that the other children in the class were ganging up on her.
Ms Maura Sweeney, who was acting principal of Scoil Nano Nagle, Bawnogue, Clondalkin, Dublin, in early 1998, was giving evidence on the fifth day of an action against the school by Nicola Mulvey, now aged 10.
Nicola, who was a pupil of the school in 1997-98, is suing through her mother, Ms Margaret Mulvey, of Ashwood Avenue, Clondalkin. The school denies negligence.
Earlier in the hearing, Ms Mulvey had told the court that Nicola had to spend three days in hospital after being hit and kicked in school.
Yesterday, Ms Sweeney said that, in relation to those allegations, the school was relying on information given by Ms Mulvey after the assaults were stated to have happened.
She said an incident on February 3rd, 1998, in which Ms Mulvey went into Nicola's class and spoke to the children, was highly inappropriate and in breach of all procedures. The teacher, Sister Gemma, was very upset, and when Ms Sweeney went to the classroom, she found that Ms Mulvey had given out to the children.
Her understanding of what happened was that Ms Mulvey had told the children that Nicola was sick at home.
Ms Mulvey had asked the children to stop bullying her, and said that if their parents would not do anything about it, she would "kick you up the backside" or something to that effect.
Cross-examined by Mr Richard McDonnell SC, for Nicola, Ms Sweeney said her understanding was that Ms Mulvey had gone into the classroom and blamed all the girls in the class, not the boys. The school had no evidence that all the girls were victimising Nicola.
Ms Sweeney said that, prior to January 1998, she was a senior teacher at the school, and had spent 25 years there. She had supervised the yard on a number of occasions between September and Christmas 1997, and had built up a rapport with Nicola.
Asked by Mr Finbarr Fox SC, for the school, about the six or seven occasions on which it was alleged Nicola had been assaulted, Ms Sweeney said that was not her experience as she would have been very vigilant in watching out for her.