A woman shattered her spine after leaping from a first floor window to escape a “brutal, sustained and terrifying” assault.
Rhiannon McKay told a jury she couldn’t remember why her friend Margaret Williamson turned on her during a get-together at her home in Perth’s Cromlix Road.
Williamson kicked and punched her as she lay on the floor and bit down onto her nose, drawing blood.
Ms McKay was so scared she threw herself out of her living room window, crashing down onto the ground below.
Williamson, 24, denied assaulting her friend, claiming she was acting in self defence.
But jurors at Perth Sheriff Court took just under three hours to find her guilty of assaulting to Ms McKay and causing her to escape through the window to her severe injury, permanent disfigurement and impairment.
Sheriff William Wood told Williamson: “This was a brutal, sustained and terrifying assault.
“Your victim was so petrified, she felt obliged to jump out of her first floor window to escape.
“A custodial sentence is uppermost in my mind.”
Williamson was remanded in custody and will be sentenced next month.
Victim screamed for help
The trial heard Ms McKay suffered multiple injuries, including a fractured spine and pubic bone, after plunging about 15ft from her living room window on March 6, 2021.
The 30-year-old said she had known Williamson for years and arranged to meet her that afternoon.
The pair, along with Williamson’s boyfriend Craig Nixon, bought vodka, lager and brandy from Tesco on Edinburgh Road before returning to Ms McKay’s one-bedroom flat.
They spent time listening to music and drinking.
Ms McKay, who gave evidence by video link, said the mood was fine to begin with, but events took a nasty turn.
She said she could not remember how events unfolded, but recalled being assaulted by Williamson on her living room floor.
“She was hitting me,” she said. “There was kicking and punching. Kicking me to the head.
“She bit my nose. There was blood inside my mouth.”
The court heard Ms McKay swung a punch at her attacker when she wouldn’t let go of her nose with her teeth.
“I just remember being terrified, that’s all I can remember feeling,” she said.
Ms McKay told the trial she felt she was unable to exit the room.
“There wasn’t much I could do,” she said. “She (Williamson) was standing at the living room door.
“All I can recall is opening the window and screaming for help.
“After that, I can’t remember anything until I woke up in hospital six hours later.”
Ms McKay spent more than a month at Ninewells.
The court was shown photos of her various injuries, including cuts and bruises to her shoulders and arms, and carpet burns which Ms McKay believed were caused by being dragged on the ground.
“It was a massively traumatic afternoon – physically and mentally – and I think that’s why I can’t remember it well,” she said.
Self defence claim
Williamson claimed that Ms McKay had assaulted her in the bedroom after becoming upset that a cup with sentimental value had been knocked over.
“I moved forward to give her a cuddle and she let out a scream and struck me with her right hand to the side of my face,” Williamson told her trial.
“I had a chipped tooth and burst lip.
“I said: ‘Please stop, I don’t know why you’re doing this.'”
Williamson claimed Ms McKay was uninjured when she “crawled” out of the bedroom, into the living room.
She said she next saw Ms McKay lying on the grass outside the flat.
However, the court heard evidence from a passing motorist who said he saw Ms McKay tumbling out of the window with blood on her face.
Fiscal depute Joanne Ritchie suggested to jurors that Williamson’s evidence had been “scripted and rehearsed”.
Williamson was acquitted of a second attack on another woman at a flat in Tay Street, Perth, on May 16, 2021. Jurors found the charge not proven.
Solicitor John McLaughlin, defending, told the court his client had been keeping out of trouble.
“She is turning her life around and trying to find employment,” he said.
Williamson, whose address was listed as Cromlix Road, will be brought back to court for sentencing on August 21.
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