Dolores O'Riordan, the lead singer of the '90s Irish rock band The Cranberries, avoided jail time Wednesday for a 2014 air-rage incident in which she assaulted three police officers and a flight attendant on a transatlantic flight, the Associated Press reported. O'Riordan pleaded guilty last December, and a judge ordered her to pay a €6,000 fine ($6,600) instead of serving her with a criminal conviction.
The 44-year-old rocker boarded an Aer Lingus flight from JFK airport in New York City to Shannon airport in Ireland in December 2014, People reported. She was arrested for stomping on a female flight attendant's foot, and she reportedly shouted at the officers, "You can't arrest me. I'm an icon, I'm the queen of Limerick [her home town]. You don't know who you are dealing with. I pay my taxes so I pay your wages and I am going to sue."
Airport police officers removed O'Riordan from the aircraft after it landed at Shannon, and she reportedly escaped from a police car en route to a police station. When officers captured her, she head-butted one officer and spat in another officer's face.
Ennis District Court Judge Patrick Durcan reviewed medical records in court on Wednesday that proved O'Riordan suffered from mental illness at the time of the incident. He said that it would be unfair to criminally convict the singer and instead ordered her to donate €6,000 ($6,600) to the court's charity, which helps prisoners who are preparing to be released from jail, according to The Telegraph.
"I don't really have much to say, just that I'm glad it's over," O'Riordan said as she left the courthouse. "I want to thank the doctors that helped me to get back to my health mentally."
