A Lowestoft woman who tried to prevent her mentally ill son from being prosecuted after he hit a couple in their 70s over the head with a brick has walked free from court after being given a suspended prison sentence

Sharon Parkes, 53, of Tonning Street, was convicted by a jury of attempting to pervert the course of justice following a week-long trial at Ipswich Crown Court last month.

She had denied attempting to pervert the course of justice in September last year by providing false information to the ambulance service during a telephone call and trying to persuade the elderly couple, who had been assaulted by her son, not to press charges.

Parkes was found guilty by a 10-two majority verdict and sentence was adjourned until yesterday (Monday) for a pre-sentence report.

She was given an eight month prison sentence suspended for 18 months and ordered to do 120 hours unpaid work in the community.

She was also ordered to pay £3,000 prosecution costs.

Lori Tucker for Parkes said her client had stopped her son from attacking the couple further and had been the only person to call for an ambulance.

During the trial, the court heard that following an attack on the couple in their garden in Lowestoft by 25-year-old Aaron Parkes, on September 9 last year, his mother Sharon Parkes lied in a call to the ambulance service by saying the elderly couple had fallen over.

She had also recorded the couple on her mobile phone saying they didn’t want to press charges against her son.

Giving evidence Parkes said she had told the ambulance service the elderly couple, who were neighbours and lived in Tonning Street, had fallen over because that is what the elderly man had told her to say.

She claimed she had been asked by the couple to record them saying they didn’t want to press charges against her son so she could show it to him so he would know there were “no hard feelings” about what he had done to them.

Aaron Parkes appeared in court in June and was ordered by a judge to be detained under the Mental Health Act after he admitted inflicting grievous bodily harm on the 71-year-old man and assaulting his 73-year-

old wife, causing her actual bodily harm.

The man in his 70s suffered cuts to his head and face and fractures to his right eye socket and the base of his skull in the horrific attack with a brick and his wife had a cut to her forehead and bruising.