The sister of tragic Olympic boxing hero Darren Sutherland has been awarded €20,000 compensation after she was sacked for refusing to wear a see-through outfit to drum up business for a nightclub in Navan.

Shaneika Sutherland of Balreask Manor in Navan told the Employment Appeals tribunal that she started to work in Taboo nightclub when she was in secondary school.

She had remained working there when she attended a college course from Monday to Thursday working full-time in the night club outside of college hours.

The nightclub was owned by a company called Bawnmanor Limited based in Watergate Street in Navan.

Sutherland said that she was employed to give out cards inviting people to attend the club at a discount rate.

She was paid a commission based on the number of these cards presented at the club. She said she also worked behind the bar and said her average wage was €323 per week.

About a month before she was dismissed, Sutherland told the tribunal that she was asked by her employer to try on an outfit which she might wear while promoting the business.

She tried on the outfit in the ladies' toilet which was see-through and she told her employer that she was "unhappy to wear it".

Sutherland claimed that the club ultimately told her that "she did not fully represent the image of the venue".

But she said she was later told that she was being dismissed because of her timekeeping even though she claimed she was never late as her parents dropped her to the club.

The tribunal chairman also raised the issue that while the employer's solicitors were present at the hearing, the employers had failed to turn up and "without justification or excuse".

The chairman, James Flanagan, BL, said that in arriving at a compensation figure he had to take account of the pay Sutherland would have earned had she not been unfairly dismissed.

The chairman also awarded Sutherland an extra €1,292 for four weeks' annual leave that was owed to her and €646 for two weeks' minimum notice.

Shaneika's brother Darren committed suicide last September in his flat in London. The Olympic silver medalist had been depressed prior to his death.

His family are unhappy about his cause of death and recently had his body exhumed so that a second post mortem could take place.