Women resume 20-year-old grudge match, this time on roller skates at a birthday party in Mattapan

When two women who'd gotten into a physical fight 20 years ago in Framingham spotted each other across the Chez Vous skating rink in Mattapan one night in January, they took up where they'd left off - and never mind both were guests at a birthday party or that they were now in their 40s.

At a hearing before the Boston Licensing Board this morning, police and rink officials said the women quickly escalated from mere accusative looks and snarls to a clinch on the evening of Jan. 31.

By the time it was over, both were at local police stations - one at B-3 right behind the rink, the other at B-2 in Roxbury - filing A&B complaints against each other. One of the women claimed she was sucker punched in the head and then, when she was down on the ground, kicked repeatedly. Her sister, who rushed over to her side, claimed their opponent bit her ring finger. An officer at B-3 advised her to get a tetanus shot.

"Two young ladies were yelling at each other at a very high tone, and proceded to what I would call tussle," a rink manager told the board.

A B-3 detective said the women were 40, 44 and 48. "Time for them to grow up, huh?" board Chairwoman Christine Pulgini mused.

The rink manager said the person who'd organized the birthday party invited the two main battlers, unaware that they'd been quietly seething about the other for two decades.

The detective said the whole matter spilled into Dorchester Municipal Court, where a clerk magistrate found probable cause for a charge against the alleged sucker-punching finger biter. But then, he said, the two main antagonists reached an agreement to just let the thing go already.

The board votes Thursday whether it thinks the rink could have prevented the fight on wheels.