NOT GUILTY: Couple Cleared Of Parking Row Assault Charge

Peter Joyce & Grecia Arancivia

A couple have been cleared of assaulting their neighbour during a parking row in their small cul-de-sac.

Tempers rose during a dispute about precious parking places and there was a confrontation involving several residents.

Account Manager Grecia Arancivia, 30, and Peter Joyce, 29, were both found not guilty of assaulting their female neighbour on October 24, last year.

Prosecutor Angela O’Dwyer told Wimbledon Magistrates’ Court: “The two defendants and the complainant Eldred Mathieson are neighbours in a cul-de-sac with limited parking.

“This has become a bone of contention and on October 24, last year there was a dispute over parking because there were only two spaces for all of the neighbours.

“After there is an argument there is a physical assault by pulling hair and clothes by Arancivia and Joyce joins in and is complicit in the complainant being pushed by them back against her car, where she bangs her head.”

However, Arancivia claimed Mathieson spat at her after flashing a two-fingered insult towards her and her boyfriend.

She described Mathieson as “goading” and “provoking” and deliberately obstructing the area with her vehicle.

During her evidence Mathieson hardly mentioned Joyce at all and the court heard little evidence of any assault by him.

She told the court it was 10pm and her car was in a parking space, when another neighbour asked if she was leaving as the defendants turned up in their vehicle.

“The male defendant said something about the parking and I saw him push my neighbour.”

Events escalated with the pushed neighbour’s father leaving the house, adding to the numbers outside.

“Everyone had something to say and the female defendant shouted at me that I was a ‘slut’ and an ‘alcoholic’, and I told her she should be ashamed of herself.

Eldred Mathieson

“She came towards me and grabbed me by my clothes and hair and thrust me back onto my car.

“I felt the thrust of my head bang back onto the car and I could see him coming towards me with his hands as if the two of them were pushing me back.

“I felt dizzy and I had a pain in my head. It was hard to believe it had happened.

“I called the police when I got back inside my house because it was an assault on me and I had a pain in my head”.

When cross-examined Mathieson denied telling Arancivia: “Go back to Peru and get your father to pay child support”.

She also denied spitting. “No, I’ve never spat at anyone in my life”.