A prison officer told Dublin Circuit Criminal Court she was headbutted and bitten by an inmate at the Dochas Centre in Mountjoy prison two years ago.
Katherina Goulding (27), Old Kilmainham Road, Dublin and Clonskeagh Road, Dublin, has pleaded not guilty to assault causing harm to Marion Kennedy, an assistant chief prison officer, on July 7th, 2004.
Ms Kennedy denied a suggestion from defence counsel Luigi Rea that she had punched Ms Goulding four or five times in the back of the head and that she had later "bounced her head off the floor".
She also rejected a further suggestion that she concocted "this story to cover up an act of brutality against my client" when she learned that Ms Goulding had made a complaint to the Garda.
Ms Kennedy told Shane Costelloe, prosecuting, that she was called to help two male officers who had discovered Ms Goulding and another prisoner, Catherine Lambert, at the entrance of a restricted attic.
They thought Ms Goulding was hiding something in her trousers and they needed female officers to search her.
Ms Kennedy said she, along with other prison officers, brought Ms Goulding and Ms Lambert to the health centre area to be searched where she saw the accused hiding what seemed to be a rope in her tracksuit bottoms.
She told the prison officers to search her when Ms Goulding "unexpectedly jumped up" and headbutted her in the left eye causing her to fall to the ground.
Ms Kennedy said Ms Goulding continued to be verbally abusive and she was removed to a padded cell by staff and restrained. She held the accused's head down but she continued to thrash about and struggle with prison officers.
She said Ms Goulding then bit her on the left shoulder. She was afraid of getting HIV or Aids so she went to Blanchardstown hospital where she received treatment.
Ms Kennedy accepted a suggestion from Mr Rea that his client was taken to the Mater hospital that day but said she did not see her being brought to the ambulance in a wheelchair.
She did not accept a suggestion that Ms Goulding reacted badly when prison officers went to take a rope from her knickers and that she had punched his client "four or five times in the back of the head".
Mr Rea said his client told gardaí that Ms Kennedy put her hand in her knickers and when she resisted, a scuffle broke out during which Ms Kennedy "threw digs and boots at her" before she later "bounced her head off the floor".
Emma Ryan, a prison officer, agreed with Mr Rea that she never approached anyone to ask them to keep CCTV footage of the alleged assault because she said it was not her place to do so.
Lynette Dowdall, a prison officer, said she contacted nurses that day when she said Ms Goulding appeared to be having a fit or seizure in the padded cell. She waited with the prisoner until an ambulance arrived.
The trial continues before Judge Frank O'Donnell and a jury of nine men and three women.