A Lavington mother still in shock at the alleged abduction of her young son has escaped conviction for an Albury court room threat to a woman charged over the incident.
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The victim was handcuffed and sitting in the dock when the offender, who cannot be named, mouthed the threat from the back row of the public gallery.
"I'll smash you," she said.
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A sheriff's officer saw what happened, then the victim complained that "she just threatened me".
The sheriff asked the woman to leave the court room and she was later charged with intimidation.
But magistrate Richard Funston told the woman he would not convict her as her guilty plea showed her remorse.
He said the way she had explained herself in court, too, demonstrated the trauma she had experienced and would continue to have to bear over the next 18 months as the matters related to her son went through the court process.
Mr Funston said he accepted the woman, 32, had been provoked on September 22 when she said she saw the victim running a finger across her neck in a throat-slitting threat.
The victim and a man, the nine-year-old's father, are facing numerous charges over an incident in which it has been alleged the boy was abducted and taken to Myrtleford.
"I'm apologising to the court, definitely," the woman said in Albury Local Court.
"I think it was more of a mother's instinct.
"I was very angry with what happened to my child.
"My family and my child have been through hell. They have been demonised."
The pair charged over the alleged abduction had their matters adjourned.
"I think I need to show a bit of understanding," Mr Funston said, "and not impose a conviction today.
"You just have to rise above it.
"I accept human nature is such that as the mother of the child you were extremely traumatised."
The woman was placed on an 18-month conditional release order.