A WOMAN said she was let down by prosecutors after her son beat her, but left court with just a £100 fine.

Sue Such, from St Peters Road, in Didcot, was attacked on August 19 this year by her 28-year-old son Craig.

She said she was kicked in the body and head with steel toe caps and beaten with a wooden framed mirror.

He was admitted common assault – but the Crown Prosecution Service now admits that charge was insufficient and he should have been facing an offence of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

Ms Such’s case comes as a charity said many more victims of parent abuse remain silent rather than shop sons or daughters.

Pictures show she had two black eyes and bruising across her body.

Ms Such said: “My own son savagely attacked me. I have never been so scared, I thought I was going to die.”

Her son pleaded guilty at Oxford Magistrates’ Court to common assault and violence to secure entry to premises and was sentenced on September 29.

He was sentenced to a 12-month supervision order, handed a restraining order, costs and a £100 fine.

Ms Such said the Crown Prosecution Service had not properly considered the facts and brought too lenient a charge.

She said: “I think the judicial system has failed me.

“But because it was all pushed through too quickly and he pleaded guilty, they can’t change the charges now.”

Ms Such believed the problem had been that many of her injuries did not show up until a few days after the attack.

She said: “I am really angry with the CPS.

“I can’t see how they can remedy it, they should have got it right the first time.

“If he had got a custodial sentence, he would have got the help he needed, but now he won’t.”

She added: “But the police were superb.

I have no doubt that if the police had not arrived as rapidly as they did, or I lived further away from the police station than I do, I would have been dead.

“I have got to come to terms with the fact this was by my son now.

“It is hard for me to say these things about him, but he needs help.”

The CPS has now apologised for the mistake. In a letter from legal manager Guy Knell, he said the decision to charge with violence to secure entry to premises had been correct.

But he added: “I have concluded that the final charging decision in relation to the assault upon you was made too soon, and at too low a level.

“The more serious charge of assault occasioning actual bodily harm should have been authorised, and I apologise for this error.”

The CPS refused to comment.