A former care worker has avoided jail for a callous attack on her wheelchair-bound former patient.
Rebecca Michelle Schembri, 36, knocked the stroke victim out of her chair with a blow to the head during a drunken attack at her home.
During the assault in Lincoln Road, Worcester Park, she verbally abused the 60-year-old, calling her a “cripple” who was faking her condition.
Shembri flipped in to a rage during a casual visit to the woman’s home, where she drank vodka as her former patient watched TV.
District Judge Robert Hunter described the attack – after which she also assaulted a police
officer – on January 4 this year as “shocking”.
The court heard how the incident had left the elderly victim “afraid of her own shadow.”
Schembri, 36, who had previously cared for her victim while working for an unnamed care agency, admitted the attack at Croydon Magistrates’ Court last month and on Thursday, May 3, was handed a suspended 12-month prison sentence, and ordered to do 200 hours community service. She is no longer working as a carer.
The court heard Schembri became increasingly drunk as the pair watched TV.
After a phone call from her husband, Schembri became angry and grabbed the elderly woman’s stroke affected arm and asked if it hurt, the court was told.
Magistrates heard Mrs Challis offered to get Schembri a taxi home, but she refused, called her a “spastic” and a “cripple” before saying: “Don’t hide in that wheelchair, fight you b****”.
Schembri shouted “Don’t think I don’t know you are putting this on” before hitting the pensioner around the head and knocking her out of the wheelchair and on to the floor in the hallway. Police arrested Schembri shortly after the incident, when she kicked a policeman.
She pleaded guilty to assault by beating and assault of a police officer.
District Judge Hunter listened to defence council Miss Billie-Joe Jennings explain how jobless Schembri was “utterly ashamed” of what she had done and how she had not had a drink since.
Mr Hunter said it was a shocking series of events and ordered Schembri to undergo alcohol treatment for six months as well as paying costs of £85.
She was told she would pay £300 compensation and be the subject of a restraining order.
Mr Hunter said: “You not only assaulted her physically but emotionally in a way that must have been very demeaning.”
When the Sutton Guardian visited her home this week to speak to her about her actions, Schembri described her behaviour as completely out of character.
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