"I was attacked"

A night out ended in violence for Cathy...

I don't think I've ever been as scared as I was the night me and my friend Lauren got mugged.

“I have to admit we were a bit tipsy...”

It was a Saturday night, and it started completely normally. We'd been to my sister's flat and we were just walking home to Lauren's house, only about 10 minutes away.

I have to admit we were tipsy. We got on and off a couple of buses as we had day riders and you can go anywhere on them. We bumped into a couple of mates and pissed about on the bus. We had a laugh.

Then me and my mate got off the bus and we found an abandoned trolley, so I said to my mate to get in it and I'd push her around.

We were laughing so much we hardly noticed where we were. Then I looked up and we were by this dark car park.

There was no-one around and it was really dark

I should have known then that it was dodgy, but it was on the way to my mate's dad's house, about two minutes away, and I was supposed to be staying round there anyway. My mate and me were screaming and laughing so hard we never saw the first boy come up to us.

He asked for the trolley straight up. We said "No, but we'll give you a ride if you like." There was something a bit weird about him, but I thought there was no harm in it.

We'd started to sober up by then and I just wanted to go home. We pushed him in the trolley for a bit, then these two girls came over.

They were riding BMX's and drinking cider. One of them was giving me the evilest look ever. A chill ran up my spine.

She asked the boy, "Who are these slags?" Lauren thought she looked like someone we knew and she was like "Hi, do we know you?" but she wasn't trying it on.

The girl replied, "Oh shut up." She then asked us to hold out our hands in front of her.

I tried to leave but it all went wrong

I knew that this was gonna turn into an argument or fight so I said to Lauren I needed the toilet. "Let's go," I said.

“She grabbed Lauren by the hair”

We were about to walk off when the girl grabbed my mate's hair and then asked me what I was gonna do now that she had my mate.

I went to walk off again thinking she would let her go.

I was about two feet in front of her when she grabbed my hair and pulled me back. I could hear my hair rip as she grabbed it. She then pulled me and my mate's heads to about this girl's knees so we couldn't do anything.

In my head I thought this really wasn't happening to us. I was really scared. Our area is quite rough, but nothing like this had ever happened to me before.

I was terrified.

The main girl told us to give her our rings. I just wanted her to let go of my hair so I did straight away. But Lauren really didn't want to.

“She punched Lauren really hard”

"If you don't give me that ring I'm going to smash your friend's face on that wall," she told Lauren. "Just give it her!" I begged. I couldn't believe that was my voice saying that, I'm normally a really strong person.

So Lauren handed her the ring. The girl let us stand up. Lauren was crying by now and I reached for her hand. But right then the boy came over and ripped my big gold earrings right out of my ears. It killed. And they had cost me £50, I'd saved up for them for ages and now he had just taken them.

The girl then hit Lauren in the stomach, she cried out in pain and I looked over to see my mate lying on the floor clutching her tummy.

We were left shocked, bleeding and in tears

The girl just looked at her with this really horrible look, and then she turned and she and the boy went off.

I pulled Lauren to her feet. She was covered in dirt and my ears were bleeding, we must have looked a right state.

We hugged and then both ran into a nearby bowling alley and called the police.

I was hysterical and so was my mate. I was punching everything and wanted to just die. I hated myself for not fighting back.

The police came and so did an ambulance because we were both shaking and crying and I think we were in shock.

“We were in shock”

We had to go to hospital to get checked over and it was only then that I started to take in what had actually happened. Even now I can hardly believe it. She could have had a knife or anything.

I was angry at myself for not fighting back, but that would have made me just as bad as her so I'm glad I didn't.

When you're actually in that situation you don't know what you'd do.

"They were done by the courts...

All three of our attackers ended up paying for what they did to us. Although I sometimes think no punishment could be as bad as how I felt that night.

“The girl got sent down for a year and a half”

The girl was caught and sent down for a year and half, but is only doing half of that. So she'll be out in the beginning of December.

The boy got 12 months community service and the other girl got nothing as she didn't actually do anything.

I'm ok now, but I still get a bit freaked out going out late at night. When I think back to me and Lauren messing about on the buses it seems like a lifetime ago.