Disabled woman beaten in robbery

Jeannie Moore passed out when the robbers threatened her

A disabled woman has been badly beaten during a robbery at her home in County Antrim.

Two masked men armed with sticks broke into the woman's home at Brooke Park in Harryville in Ballymena at about 2200 GMT on Saturday.

They demanded money and beat Jeannie Moore, who is in her 60s, with the sticks. At one point they threatened to nail her hand to a table.

The victim passed out and when she came round the intruders had fled.

She was treated in hospital for multiple bruising to her head, hands and legs.

'Deplorable'

The robbers also ransacked the living room and found a piggy bank, which they smashed open.

"He took my hand and put it on the table. He said; 'if you don't give me the rest of your money, I'll nail your hand to that table'," she said.

"The minute I heard that I must have passed out."

The chairman of Ballymena district policing partnership, Declan O'Loan of the SDLP, said the attack was "despicable."

"People like that really have absolutely no hint of moral feeling at all," he said.

Local DUP councillor Martin Clarke said the attack was deeply disturbing.

"In all these types of attacks when you hear the news it's all for a small amount of money," he said.

"I don't know what these people think they can gain, they think these people have fortunes in their houses. These are just ordinary people who don't have a big lot of money in their house.

"It's deplorable really."