An immature teenager attacked a woman and pulled her hair while on a video call after a fracas broke out over a borrowed jumper.
Cassidy Penney-Miller started laughing as she joined the assault on Kiera Prince after another woman started pushing and punching her inside their shared home in Gillingham.
Cassidy Penney-Miller was on a Facetime call when she pulled the woman’s hair and laughed about it
After an argument started about the item of clothing Ms Prince had borrowed, Penney-Miller, 19, not only pulled her hair but laughed as she did so while also on a video call.
The incident happened in an assisted shared accommodation property in Marlborough Road on October 22, 2023.
Penney-Miller, now of Hoopers Road, Rochester, had initially denied an allegation of assault by beating and another charge of criminal damage.
She was found guilty of the assault at trial in October last year but found not guilty of the criminal damage charge.
At the time sentencing was adjourned to allow a pre-sentencing report to be carried out on her and she returned to Medway Magistrates’ Court on Thursday (January 2) to hear her fate.
Cassidy Penney-Miller was sentenced at Medway Magistrates’ Court. Stock picture
Lucie Fish, prosecuting, said: “This is an assault and the victim was Kiera Prince and there was another woman involved and it happened in assisted accommodation.
“The other woman pleaded guilty to assault and criminal damage and was given a conditional discharge but this defendant pleaded not guilty but was found guilty of the assault at trial.”
The prosecutor then told the court the argument broke out in the home over an item of clothing that had been lent to the victim.
Ms Fish added: “She (the victim) was pushed and her hair was pulled and punched and her hair was pulled (by the other woman) and then Penney-Miller grabbed the victim by the hair and pulled it and in the other hand she was holding her mobile and recording it and was laughing.
“The attack went on for one or two minutes and the defendant pulled her hair, it was a lesser role and there was minor harm.”
The court also heard that Ms Prince had written a victim impact statement in which she said the attack had made her feel like s*** and that it was awful to have to live in the same house as her attackers.
However, magistrates also heard Penney-Miller had since moved out of the property and was now living in a flat on her own.
She knew she’d done something wrong all along
Tahir Saeed, mitigating, said his client had indeed played a lesser role in the attack.
He added: “She knows she has done wrong and she grabbed the victim’s hair, but she knew she’d done something wrong all along.
“It was an argument over a jumper but then escalated over a mobile phone and a support worker tried to intervene.
“She wasn’t recording she was on Facetime Live with someone, but wasn’t recording as an act of malice, it was immaturity.
“She was in the care system as she was not in her mum’s control, but they now have a good relationship and she has support (where she’s now living) and is going to college.
“I would concur that you (magistrates) could go with the recommendations of the pre-sentencing report of a conditional discharge as it was some time ago.
“She is trying to make a positive contribution to others now and is trying to help others with dealing with problems within the care system.”
Asked by magistrates if she had learned her lesson – Penney-Miller replied: “Yes.”
They then told her as she was of previous good character and has now turned her life around and stabilised her behaviour they were prepared to give her a 12-month conditional discharge.
They ordered she pay £300 court costs and a victim surcharge of £26.
She will pay what she owes the court at a rate of £20 a month as she’s on benefits.