A WORCESTERSHIRE judge has said he is “very, very concerned” to see young women drinking to excess following the murder of Glasgow student Karen Buckley.

Speaking at Worcester Magistrates Court on Friday, April 17 – two days after the body of the Irish student, who went missing after a night out in Glasgow on Saturday, April 11, was discovered on a farm near the city – District Judge Nigel Cadbury said he was concerned young women were placing themselves in danger by drinking to the point where they could not remember what they had done.

Mr Cadbury was speaking as 21-year-old Leanne Roberts of Styles Court, Ombersley, appeared in court charged with assaulting a woman outside Lloyds Bar in Broad Street, Worcester, in the early hours of Sunday, March 22.

Prosecutor Owen Beale said the victim had been out with her family celebrating her parent’s wedding anniversary and were standing outside the bar when they saw Roberts “clearly very affected by alcohol”.

“She was swaying and bouncing off doors,” he said.

“(The victim) was just saying goodbye when Mrs Roberts appeared next to her and punched with a clenched fist.”

He said the bar’s security staff intervened and called police, who arrived and arrested Roberts, who is married and has a two-year-old daughter.

“She said she had been out with friends had had two cans of cider before she went out, when she had shots of sambuca and cocktails,” he said.

“The next thing she remembered was being at the charge desk at the police station.

“She didn’t remember anything after about 10.30pm and couldn’t understand why she would have done it.”

Mr Beale added Roberts and the victim, who suffered a bruise to her cheek and felt unable to go to her work at a wedding venue until it had healed, had never met before.

Barry Newton, defending, said Roberts, who was cautioned in February 2014 for hitting a barman, very rarely got the chance to go out due to her commitments as a mother.

“It’s self-evident that from mixing drinks that she got herself extremely drunk,” he said.

“She was very sorry for her actions.”

Although he added Roberts did not have a drinking problem, Mr Cadbury, disagreed, saying: “There is a drinking problem because she can’t remember what she did.

“That is a problem.”

He added it was “very, very worrying” to see Roberts and other young women her age putting themselves at risk by drinking to the point they did not know what they were doing.

“I find it incredible that young people can get so drunk that they don’t even know who they’re with,” he said.

“One only has to think about the horrible situation in Glasgow to see how serious this could have been.

“It’s very, very worrying how young girls put themselves in such very, very vulnerable positions.”

Handing Roberts a six-month community order including a six-week curfew forbidding her from leaving her home between 9pm and 7am and a requirement to carry out 16 days of rehabilitation, Mr Cadbury said: “I am sure you are now aware of how vulnerable you placed yourself in”.

She was also ordered to pay £200 compensation to the victim and a £60 victim surcharge.