Grandmother jailed for sexually assaulting young man and threatening to blow up filling station

A 47-year-old grandmother from Northern Ireland has been jailed for nine months for sexually abusing a young man after she forced herself on him, grabbed his bottom and told him that she loved him. Caroline Irwin, of Lisnaskea, County Fermanagh, also threatened to blow up a filling station while holding a petrol pump in one hand and a cigarette lighter in the other. She denied the sexual assault charge but failed to turn up for her trial and was convicted in her absense. Irwin was also ordered to sign the Sex Offenders’ Register for seven years.

The victim of the sexual assault had described how, on November 2, last year, he received a text message from a woman telling him to call a her house to collect the £10 she owed him for cutting her lawn. When he got there Irwin was in the house. The woman asked the young man to carry Irwin’s bags to a waiting taxi. The man described how Irwin told him he had lovely hands and as he walked out the door “she grabbed me by the backside, four of five times”. As he continued on out through the garden gate “she tried to give me a love bite” on the left side of the neck. He described how he moved his head to prevent Irwin from giving him the love bite. “She tried to snog me but that didn’t work either,” he added.



He said he told her: “Please stop. I don’t like this.” The man explained how Irwin put her arms around him and tried to snog him, telling him: “I know you very well and I love you.” However, the man told the court “I didn’t know her at all” and that he pushed her away. District Judge Nigel Broderick said he was entirely satisfied that the man had given a “credible and reliable” account of what happened. He convicted Irwin of sexually assaulting the man. Irwin admitted being disorderly at Swift’s Supervalu at Main Street, Lisnaskea, and threatening to destroy a fuel pump. The court heard that Irwin stood with a petrol pump in one hand and a cigarette lighter in the other shouting: “Get your children away. I’m going to blow this place up.”

There were several members of the public and staff in the area at the time. Defence barrister Steffan Rafferty said Iwin should be given credit for admitting all the offences except for the sexual assault. Mr Rafferty described Irwin as a woman who "hasn't been without her troubles. Her primary problem is alcohol consumption and the company she has been keeping hasn’t helped. It was a fire she wasn’t able to get herself out of.” Jailing her for a total of nine months, the District Judge told Irwin the sexual assault on the young man was aggravated by the fact that the injured party had to come to court and give evidence. He added that the incident at the filling station "when you quite dangerously took a fuel pump and had a cigarette lighter and threatened to damage" the premises would have been of "great concern to anyone who witnessed it".