A WOMAN found guilty of assaulting a former friend on a remote Cumbrian beach has lost an appeal against her conviction.

Judith Wildwood, 58, was brought to court following an incident in the tiny coastal community of Braystones, near Beckermet, in January last year.

Wildwood had denied assaulting Suzie Brook. But in May she was convicted of the offence after a magistrates’ court trial.

A community order was handed down as a punishment to Wildwood, who was ordered to complete 120 hours of unpaid work.

She was also made the subject of a retraining order. This prevented her from contacting either Miss Brook or her partner, Tomasz Biedka, and also from approaching her property.

However, Wildwood continued to protest her innocence and lodged an appeal against both the conviction and sentence at Carlisle Crown Court yesterday.

But having heard evidence from key witnesses in the case, Judge Barbara Forrester, sitting with two magistrates, dismissed the appeal.

The court was told Wildwood moved into a property at Braystones during late 2012.

She and Miss Brook were said to have developed a mutual friendship initially. But within months this “entirely fell apart”.

Since then police had been informed of many incidents involving the respective parties.

By the time Wildwood was brought to court last May, she had already been convicted of an assault upon Miss Brook.

She was then found guilty of a second offence, which occurred on January 9 last year after Miss Brook and Wildwood came face-to-face on the beach.

Giving evidence about that incident, Miss Brook accepted she did not suffer any injuries as a result of the assault by Wildwood.

But Miss Brook confirmed: “She pushed me; shoved me with her shoulders and pushed me.”

Mr Biedka confirmed he was present at the time of the incident.

“If there hadn’t been any witnesses, she (Miss Brook) might have been beaten up,” he told the court.

Wildwood, however, disagreed.

In a police interview she had called Miss Brook’s complaint “a pack of lies” and “entirely fictional”.

And in evidence Wildwood claimed there had been “no contact” between the pair.

However, Judge Forrester concluded that she and her two colleagues were “satisfied” with the accounts given by Miss Brook and Mr Biedka.

Wildwood, of Inglenook Holiday Park, Lamplugh, must continue with her unpaid work and was said to have 41 hours left to do.