A woman threatened to attack a prosecution witness on the school run – leaving the victim hysterical and a young child upset, Swindon Magistrates’ Court heard.
35-year-old Sasha Mcgailey was convicted of intimidating a witness as they crossed paths in the Park North area shortly after 8am on 20 January last year.
The victim – who is referred to as Miss M throughout this report – was taking her four-year-old to nursery when she saw the defendant. In a bid to avoid confrontation, she smiled.
But Mcgailey approached the victim, who previously provided a statement to the police supporting a harassment case. The allegation was made against the defendant by a different person.
She shouted: “Why did you give that f***ing statement to the police?” before threatening to take off her shoe and hit Miss M around the head with it if she did not retract it.
Scared of repercussions, Miss M told Mcgailey that she would retract her statement after she’s dropped her child to nursery.
Mcgailey, who was walking her own children to school during the incident, blocked her path several times before kicking the victim’s pushchair and walking off.
Giving evidence, Miss M said: “I was frightened, scared and my heart was racing”.
She phoned the police officer dealing with the case, leaving an intelligible voicemail. She proceeded to drop her child at nursery, where the manager immediately noticed her distress and took her to a private room.
The manager told the court that it took at least ten minutes before she could understand what Miss M was telling her about the incident, due to hysterical crying and shaking.
When Mcgailey was asked about the threat, she said: “That is just silly, I had new converse so it would have taken me a while to get them off.”
She told said that she only asked the victim why she lied in her statement and the conversation was perfectly friendly.
Prosecutor Roxy Cole said that she was “intimidated and scared enough to retract her statement”, doing so in April 2023 – in the middle of the ongoing court case.
However, the retraction failed to have the intended result – as Mcgailey was convicted of harassment involving fear of violence and sentenced to a community order in November 2023.
Magistrate Martin Clarke found Mcgailey, of Welbeck Close, Walcot, guilty of intimidating a witness, telling her that they thought the victim was “consistent and credible and convincing”.
He said that her version of events were “substantially corroborated” by the nursery manager.
Adding: “Sasha by yourself, in your own evidence here on the stand, you admitted going to [Miss M] and asking her why she was lying. That in itself is confrontational and threatening.”
Mr Clarke told the court that her pre-sentence report labelled her a medium risk in relation to emotional and psychological harm to known adults and members of the public.
Mcgailey, who has 62 previous convictions, also pleaded guilty to two new offences – the theft of shopping from Asda and Pokemon cards valued at £23.99 from Waterstones.
Magistrates handed down six-month prison sentence suspended for 18 months due to the fact she is around 28 weeks pregnant and there is a prospect of rehabilitation.
“You breach the order in any way, in any way, then you’re going to get a more serious sentence and this will most likely get activated. Just be careful how you live your life going forward”, Mr Clarke concluded.
