A sheriff has called for further examination after a man claimed he assaulted a woman in an Aberdeen maternity ward because she was smoking crack.
Aberdeen Sheriff Court heard on Christmas Eve that Ruaraidh Hutchison, 43, was at Aberdeen Maternity Hospital on Cornhill Road, Aberdeen, on September 28 this year when he assaulted a woman known to him.
Fiscal depute Jade Wong told the court the woman had recently given birth and that a student nurse walked into her room to find Hutchison assaulting her.
“He was holding the complainer against the wall by her neck and his other hand was pushed up against her body. The witness took the accused into another room and police were called.”
Hutchison, whose address was given in court papers as Hetherwick Road, Aberdeen, admitted assaulting the woman by seizing her by the neck and holding her against a wall.
Sheriff Graham Buchanan was told Hutchison had woken up at the hospital to find the woman smoking crack cocaine, which made him angry.
Sheriff Buchanan said: “If that was indeed the case – about this person taking drugs in her room at the maternity hospital at 5.30am – I suppose that might be something that would anger the accused – although his actions were still entirely unacceptable and thoroughly inappropriate. I would have thought the staff would very much want to know if it were the case that a patient in the hospital who has just given birth to a baby is consuming drugs in a room.
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“Why hadn’t the accused mentioned earlier that the complainer had been smoking crack with her friends?
“It seems remarkable that such behaviour was going on in that room and the staff would not have known about it.”
Sheriff Buchanan added: “I think, as a matter of importance, it is something we need clarity on.”
He asked depute fiscal Jade Wong to make inquiries to see “if there is substance” to the accused’s claim.
Sentencing was deferred until January 2l.
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