Family Court: Husband granted protection after attack by wife

A husband whose wife stabbed him in the neck with a scissors has been granted a temporary domestic violence order against her at the Dublin District Family Court.

The man, who is in his 60s, told Judge Miriam Walsh yesterday he had been married for 36 years and lived with his wife and two adult children.

He said on Monday his wife threw a knife at him and stuck a scissors in his neck. She would have injured him further if his adult daughter had not intervened.

He also said that over the Christmas break his wife pushed him down the stairs and threw a hammer at him. He told the judge his wife had suffered all her life with mental health issues and was on anti-depressants, but had become more violent recently. He was afraid of her, he said.

Protection order

Judge Walsh asked if he was requesting a protection order, under which his wife could not use violence or threaten to use violence against him, or a barring order, which would require her to leave the family home.

“Are you afraid she’ll kill you?” the judge asked.

“Yes, she’s threatened to kill me,” the man said. He said he did not want her barred from the house because she had nowhere else to go.

Judge Walsh granted a temporary protection order with a return date in April when the man and his wife are scheduled to appear in court. She said she would ask gardaí to serve the order and told the man to call them if there was a breach of it.

A garda sat in on each case before Judge Walsh, who was recently assaulted while hearing a domestic violence application in the same court room. There were 10 applications yesterday, eight for domestic violence orders and two for summonses sought by fathers who had been refused access to their children over Christmas.

The judge granted a short-term barring order to a young woman against her partner of three years.

The woman said her partner woke her up in the early hours of Sunday morning. He was drunk and shouting, she said, and she shouted back at him. He pulled her from her bed by the hair and dragged her to the balcony on the landing and threatened to throw her over. He also threatened her with a screwdriver.

She said if their tenant had not woken up and stopped him, he would have done something bad to her.

It was not the first time he had been violent, she said, as 18 months ago he had punched her in the eye and pulled her along the ground. He left for three days and when he returned, he was “really, really sorry”. He said he didn’t want anything from her, but asked if he could live in the house. She agreed and after a time, when he had been “very good and wasn’t drinking”, their relationship restarted. Then he began drinking again.

Granting the order until a full court hearing on January 6th, the judge said the man’s behaviour was unacceptable.

Another woman told the judge her 19-year-old son had smashed up the family home on St Stephen’s Day. On another occasion, he had pushed her up against the door with a hurley stick and threw her across the floor. The mother said she had tried to help him and got him anger management classes, but he wouldn’t go. She said she was worried for the safety of her other young son.

The judge granted a barring order until January 7th, when a full hearing is scheduled.