THE CASE against a mother of three charged with passing drugs to a man through a French kiss outside a courthouse has been dismissed due to a gap in evidence.
Suzanne Dowling (27) appeared before Castlecomer District Court, Co Kilkenny, yesterday where she was jailed for three months on a separate charge of assaulting a tenant liaison officer at her address at Church Avenue, Castlecomer.
She was also before the court on a charge of supplying two “wraps” of heroin to a man in custody through a “full-blown French kiss”.
Supt Patrick Mangan, of Kilkenny Garda station, told the court that prison officer John Howlin had given evidence that a woman called Suzanne approached his prisoner and kissed him, passing him a prohibited article on April 19th, 2007.
Michael Lanigan, solicitor for Dowling, said there had been “insufficient” evidence to identify his client as the person who passed the drugs.
He said the prison officer had told the court that “a lady called Suzanne” had passed the drugs to the prisoner, but did not identify her as Dowling.
Judge William Harnett said he did not have any notes as to what happened in the time interval between the prisoner arriving in the prison van to him being in court other than this embrace being referred to. Judge Harnett said that “in the absence of evidence” he was dismissing the case against Dowling.
Dowling pleaded guilty yesterday to assaulting Kilkenny County Council officer Jim Ryan when he arrived to serve notice at her address in Castlecomer, on April 22nd last year.
Insp Aidan Brennan told the court Dowling kicked Mr Ryan, verbally abused him and told him to remove himself from the house.
Mr Lanigan told the court his client has had addiction problems with heroin for a number of years and was making progress on a methadone programme.
Judge Harnett sentenced Dowling to three months in prison for the assault on Mr Ryan.