A VULNERABLE woman, who repeatedly assaulted police and healthcare staff who tried to stop her harming herself, has been jailed for 110 days.

Shanice Shepherd was sentenced at Furness and District Magistrates Court on Thursday (18) for two assaults on Furness General Hospital nursing staff, four assaults against police officers, a charge of obstructing a police officer in execution of his duty, two public disorder offences and one of carrying two knives in Hollywood Park and the FGH Accident and Emergency department.

The 22-year-old, of Egerton Court, Barrow, had pleaded guilty to all charges except for one assault against an FGH nurse, for which she was found guilty at trial on May 15.

Shepherd was being treated as a sectioned inpatient at the Dova Unit acute mental health inpatient facility in Barrow at the time of the offences, described to the court by Mr Peter Kelly, prosecuting.

On March 1, Shepherd assaulted a nursing assistant, by pushing him against a wall. She later bit a female officer who tried to intervene.

On March 4, Shepherd failed to return to the unit. She was found at the back of Barrow’s Oxford Street and began screaming hysterically, brandishing a glass bottle at officers before trying to burn one with a cigarette. On March 10, she assaulted a nurse trying to restrain her.

On March 12, Shepherd took two butter knives and left the unit before taking an overdose. She met police in Hollywood Park and was taken to A and E, where the butter knives fell out of her clothes.

On Tuesday this week, police were told Shepherd had taken an overdose and arrested her for her safety. At the station, she began shouting at the custody sergeant, accusing him of rape, swearing and threatening to kill him.

In A and E, Shepherd tried to rip her clothes into a tourniquet. When police intervened, she hit one officer and kicked another. The disturbance was witnessed by patients including a small child who was “very upset”.

Miss Karen Templeton, defending, explained the severity of Shepherd’s difficulties. In the preceding week alone, she added, the defendant had been admitted to three different hospitals, taken an overdose, tried to throw herself off Barrow’s Michaelson Road Bridge and swallowed broken glass and razor blades.

Miss Templeton said: “Self harm is a big theme running through this. She has extremely significant mental health issues; trauma arising from when she was younger, she’s in and out of secure units. Miss Shepherd is in somewhat a league of her own.”