A 15-year-old schoolgirl was frog-marched through a shopping centre store after being publicly and wrongly accused of shoplifting, a judge heard yesterday.
Barrister David Dodd told the Circuit Civil Court that school friends of Michelle Gahan, along with other customers in a Dublin pharmacy, banged and kicked the door when a security guard locked her in a room with him.
Friends telephoned Ms Gahan’s mother, Jackie Kelly, Fairways Avenue, Finglas, Dublin, who alerted gardaí and had her daughter freed after 45 minutes spent in the Boots chemist store in the Jervis Shopping Centre, Dublin.
Ms Gahan sued for defamation of character, assault and false imprisonment.
Circuit Court president Mr Justice Matthew Deery, who approved a settlement offer of €16,500 for Ms Gahan, said the court had, last June, rejected as inadequate an offer of €10,000 from the defendants.