A woman drank at least seven pints of cider and then bottled a barmaid who asked her to leave the premises.
Samantha Hay, 36, has avoided going to jail for the drunken attack outside the Claymore Bar on Grantown-on-Spey’s High Street.
After staff tried to persuade Hay to head home, she returned to the venue and lashed out, hitting one member of staff in the face with a bottle.
She appeared for sentencing at Inverness Sheriff Court on Thursday, after previously pleading guilty to a charge of assault.
Hay had also admitted to another charge of being drunk in charge of a vehicle on the same night.
Accused asked to leave ‘due to her intoxication and unruliness’
Fiscal depute Victoria Silver told the court that the incident started around 9pm on March 17 of this year.
Two bar staff members decided to approach Hay.
“The shift started at 6pm,” she said, adding: “The accused had been drinking for the duration of the shift.
“Around 9pm, they asked the accused to leave due to her intoxication and unruliness. She had been served at least seven pints of cider.”
The court heard that Hay obeyed the request to leave, but on two occasions that followed, she returned to the premises.
Around 11pm, staff were outside “encouraging her to go home” when Hay hit a barmaid in the face with a bottle, leaving her with a minor cut and swelling.
The frightened staff then ran back inside the pub and locked the door before calling the police.
‘This was a very violent offence. I don’t care how drunk you were’
When officers arrived, they found Hay near a vehicle for which she had the key.
A test carried out in the early hours of the following morning revealed her alcohol level to be 74mcg in 100ml of breath – more than three times the legal limit of 22mcg.
Defence solicitor Ethan Llewellyn said that his client had made “a very clear error in judgment”.
He said Hay, of Cawdor Road Terrace, Nairn, took responsibility for her actions.
Sheriff Eilidh MacDonald warned Hay: “If you ever consider hitting somebody in the face with a bottle outside a pub again you will be sent to jail.
“This was a very violent offence. I don’t care how drunk you were.”
She imposed a community payback order on Hay with one year of supervision and ordered her to carry out 126 hours of unpaid work in the community.
She also issued Hay with 10 penalty points for being drunk in charge of a vehicle and fined her £470.
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