A Hawick woman who broke another woman’s thumb after assaulting her was sentenced to a 12-month community payback order, with a condition she completes 200 hours of unpaid work.
Deborah Higgins, 40, of Noble Place, appeared on indictment and admitted repeatedly punching and kicking the woman, and bending her thumb, all to her severe injury and permanent impairment, at a house in the town’s Trinity Street on April 3 last year.
Iain Burke, defence solicitor, said it was a week later before the victim realised her thumb was broken.
He pointed out that the complainer had stayed with his client after the offence, adding: “She crashed at her house that night.”
Sheriff Kevin Drummond told Higgins: “The combined circumstances enable me to deal with this by unpaid work in the community, but the severity of the injury requires that it be at the upper end of the range.”