Three charges of assault against a Longford woman accused of physically abusing two people with intellectual and physical disabilities have been dismissed at Longford District Court.
After hearing evidence for nearly four hours today, Judge Seamus Hughes described the evidence of Judy Maher, the main witness to the prosecution, as conflicting and confusing.
All three charges against Roberta Neilon Hynes, of Castlenugent, Granard, Co Longford, have now been dismissed.
Ms Maher earlier told the court that she did not want to be a whistleblower but had made the allegations because the people were vulnerable and she knew the truth.
Answering questions from District Court Judge Seamus Hughes, she said the residents of the Oaklands Grove community house in Longford were afraid of Ms Neilon Hynes.
She said things had somewhat improved in general procedures for care homes after the RTÉ expose of events at Aras Attracta in Co Mayo.
She said more training was now been provided, there were more forms to fill up when incidents happened and they had received high quality safeguard advice on what to report and what not to report to the authorities.
This afternoon, two other care workers gave evidence.
Veronica Beirne and Helen Brady both said they had seen bruising on a 54-year-old man who was living in the house but both women said they had never seen Ms Neilon Hynes abuse anybody.
Ms Brady told the judge she was shocked and upset when she heard the allegation, saying "I wanted to go home and never come back."
