£100,000 own goal over wayward football

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After a three-day trial that has cost the taxpayer more than £100,000, a jury took 30 minutes to clear Susannah Marmot, 42, of attacking George Louka.

Mrs Marmot, of St Margaret's Road, Edgware, denied assault occasioning actual bodily harm. She had asked Mr Louka to return her child's football after it had rolled into his garden.

Dustman Mr Louka, 53, had said Mrs Marmot pushed his head against a doorframe causing injuries to his face that needed 10 stitches.

But after the acquittal, it emerged that two senior judges had warned the Crown Prosecution Service to "review carefully the prospects of a conviction in this case".

It also emerged that Mr Louka, the only prosecution witness, was known for calling police repeatedly to make allegations about neighbours. Once he claimed children were playing with firearms in the north London street. Armed officers, scrambled to the scene, found children with cap guns.

"He was always going on at the children in the street, whatever they were doing," said Mrs Marmot outside court after her acquittal. Referring to the BBC sitcom bigot played by Warren Mitchell, she added: "He said the kind of stuff that would make Alf Garnett wince."

It was alleged that Mrs Marmot pushed Mr Louka in the chest and forced her way into his house last October. But she said that he had hurt himself when attacking her.

At the end of the hearing the football was returned to Mrs Marmot's husband, Joshua.