Warning of how your property can be devalued

MascaraMinx

Sounds like you have had a terrible time of things. I am trying to think of some pathways you can take. Just a couple of questions:

Why was the judge unable to impose a penalty because you had used CCTV?

What grounds were the Housing Association threatening to sue you on because you went to the police?? That seems bizarre

Have you considered going down the route of an ASBO?

Which police force covers your area? It sounds like there are some very serious issues there with death threats, harrassment and anti-social behaviour. Why don't want the police want to know? Even when they have said that her behaviour would continue even if she moved out?

mi-key

I think the OP's main problem is that even if they get rid of the current nutter next door ( and if it was me, sending someone round to drop her down a mine shaft somewhere would be top of my list ! ) is that the HA can put in someone just as bad or worse to replace her.

Yes, before people say, I know that you do get some perfectly respectable and nice people in HA accomadation, but it seems in a lot of areas that the HA's give priority to people with mental problems or abusive partners etc....

I was made homeless when I was 17, and went to the local housing office to see if they could help - they told me to basically find a comfy cardboard box as single males were never housed in that area as they werent seen as being vulnerable enough.

The woman did hint that the only way I would get a flat was if I had a history of serious mental health problems !!!

If there is a shortage of HA places in an area, the priority will be given to those they consider most at risk, and these seem to be the really bad ones.

Sadly I dont think there is anything the OP can do legally without risking losing far more than they can gain.

The OP doesnt mention where they live or what the house is worth, but as neither they nor their parents are working, so have no job ties, would moving to a completely new area be out of the question ? Selling the current house cheap to a BTL muppet may make enough to buy somewhere in a different area where prices are not so high.

OpalElite

Thank you for your answers.

My parents are both retired and I am disabled and it looks like I may never be able to work again. My parents do not want to rent out the property as they can not see who would want to rent it given the problem with the neighbour.

As for location, we live in east London in one of the Olympic boroughs, now I know people will not believe me but even downsizing to a 2 bed house without garage and garden we would still not be able to afford a property. We currently have a 3 bed, biggest garden on the development and a garage. We have been looking at places to buy outside London but we would not be able to afford to purchase a property outright.

Another issue with location is that we want to keep under the same cancer dr for my father. It took 18 months before the hospital realised that he had cancer and this dr has restored our faith - moving too far away and having to change hospitals is something we are trying to avoid.

The judge we had at Bow County Court was more interested in getting away for his golf game. What our barrister refused to give the court was still photos of our CCTV system as it was being installed. The neighbour is clearly watching and later she stands on a chair to take photos over our back fence, something she has done many times before (our living room is at the back and unoverlooked by any houses). At our solicitors advice we moved the cameras to capture the harassment, and yes we did have her front and back gardens in view, but 11 days after the London Bombings without any provocation from us she starts to shout from front and back gardens that she is "going to get someone to blow up your house". The judge said this is not a serious death threat - I disagree as I state it is a very unusual threat, stab maybe, shot if have access to a gun but blow you up - to us that is a clear indication that extreme violence is intended. We have since moved the cameras and a top police officer at our local station has written a letter supporting us. He was going to get his officers to investigate throughly, the problem was I keep all the video tapes for a day if we have an incident to prove we have done nothing. That is why in May this year there were over 80 video tapes alone. When I emailed this he suddenly stopped any investigation. I have already 3 complaints being investigated by the IPCC - one for an officer being bullied and taken off the case then the arrest that he was going to make against our neighbour for harassment stopped. He had the police officers in place, the van and social services to take care of the children. Since then we have been subjected to what can only be likened to office politics, because x was going to do something then we won't. This is the MET we are talking about and you only have to look a the news to see how often they mismanage cases.

The time with the knife she was arrested, charged and pleaded guilty to threats to kill. In the mean time she was singing my fathers name and saying "I might as well kill you" and coming outside and being physically close when we go in and out. The police kept saying the investigating officer should deal with the other threats but she had already told me should would not. So now we have this conviction against this woman (she was given an 18 month conditional discharge) but we have to hope the police take her to court for the same charge in order for her to go to prision over this. There has been at least five other times when she has been that violent to us but the police do not want to know.

As to the neighbourhood helping, most are scared of her as she assaulted another mother at the local school, in front of the reception class. Plus they have all heard her beating up the boys father, his begging to "stop hitting me woman" was screamed at full volume. There are 3 household that are on her side. One is a computer programmer that has to pay thousands of pounds each year to be a member of computing institues, now I have 2 computer science degrees and even though I have not worked for 5 years I can get interviews in Blue Chip companies because of my degrees and he would not even get that (I have seen non degree CVs thrown into bins at career fairs and asked the Pru why they were doing it, other companies did it for the same reason). The other two I have no idea why they are making up such wild stories about us, apparently my father is making up his disabilities but both people were in court stating they saw the first tenant beat him up and cause his disabilities. Basically I would not want anyone to help anyway as that would give this one the excuse to pick on them as well, and as most are either disabled or have young children I would not want that on my conscene(sorry sp?).

Our private injunction was an abso, people try and say it is not but an asbo has the word injunction at the top and ours had the power of arrest attached and that made it stronger than a normal asbo.

The last point is the one people have the most problem with - there is no person or organisation or even the government that can make the housing association evict this woman. They have already admitted that she has broken her tenancy agreement but they always support her. The reason they were going to take us to court they claimed was because we were racist, I had to ask friends "As you are black can you please write a letter to the court to say we are not racist" I should not have to do that. What they were trying to do was to get us to drop our court case, even with the police taking this last incident they got the anti social behaviour manager at the council to try and scare us. Point is he claimed to speak for the police, and the noise team at the council. Both said he did not speak for them but his letters state that if we did not stop reporting this womans behaviour to the police then the council would sue us. We took the letter straight to our councillor and said - remember the complaint I lodged in February 2006 that this department is not tackling anti social behaviour but is protecting Circle Anglia tenants? We we have the proof. I have to put in another formal complaint, but our councillor can not understand why the housing association are not doing anything.

Just to clarify - Circle Anglia can put in a tenant that they usually know is violent and when they receive complaints about them they ignore them. They have policies in place that look very strong but they do NOT unhold them.

Thank you for replying, I think the best thing we can do is to tell people what has happened. There needs to be a change in the law to protect homeowners as currently there is nothing.

lynzpower

One issue is to get environmental health round in respect of the noise. they can set up recording equipment while they are not there I believe. I know little about community protection, but if someone persists then they can be imprisoned for this. TJ27 works in environmental porotection, I wonder whether he may be able to offer anything?

Can you get a restraining order? ie not to come within X of the property. If so the minute she breaches then the police HAVe to arrest, dont they?

I am racking my brains for you.

I have worked with a number of women like you describe in my many years in social services, and I need a bit of time to have a good think about how they have been evicted.

If I come up with anything Ill let you know here.

BUt thinking of you.

Sapphire

Just a thought, but have you tried the Citizens' Advice Bureau? And perhaps Age Concern, given that your parents are elderly? They may be able to do something.

I know what it is like to have bad neighbours (though not as bad as yours). I moved a couple of years ago because of the extremely loud bawling of a West Indian baby that was adopted by the couple living next door to me (he West Indian, she white). The noise was just terrible. I couldn't sleep for months and even tried sleeping in the conservatory for a while, but the noise was still to be heard there . . . I now understand how this type of thing can ruin your life.

Good luck – I hope you will resolve your problem.

OpalElite

Thank you for your replies.

The noise team on the local council use to be incredibly bad so we gave up. But after our own injunction that had a noise component but we did not involve any outside agency. We started to call the noise team last November and after a shakey start I have nothing but praise for them. The noise abatement notice they served on her in March was for music during the day (4pm to be precise). Whereas before the noise officers would insist first that we shut our windows and turn up the tv these did not. They said it was a hard case as the music did not have bass and so we believe she has been prosecuted before. They served the notice as an officer identified the radio station from the phone number read out, this was when he was in our living room (windows were shut because it was cold) and it was coming through the party wall.

On the five occasions since that the music has been that loud to consistute a breach the officers have either not been available or not gotten down in time. But they are very supportive especially of in respect to the anti social behaviour officer who claims that I should not be reporting "Household noise". The noise team were angry as constant heavy banging on the party wall for up to 15 minutes, very heavy stomping and down the stairs constantly and slamming doors so hard that it shakes our house up to six times in succession is not normal household noise. On the occasions when she goes out for hours on end and leaves the music on, it is not loud enough for them to consistute a breach so although we log it on their system we do not ask them to come down.

As to the restraing order, we had hoped that the magistrate would impose one last Friday. That did not happen, and our private injunction we had hoped then to have a component but because we are not related to this woman then we can not get it. Our solicior does not want us to spend money when he knows the outcome would not be helpful.

Thank you for your replies. It is making me feel better posting these responses as for years we have had trouble getting people to acknowledge what is happening.

Helen

lynzpower

helen
have you gone through the complaints process at Circle Anglia??

lynzpower

Ive just looked at thier website

What are Circle Anglia’s service standards for dealing with anti-social behaviour?

We will:
Use a range of prevention measures to reduce anti-social behaviour
Take a victim-centred approach Investigate all complaints of anti-social behaviour
Always have someone available to deal with anti-social behaviour during office hours
Respond to racial harassment and domestic violence within 24 hours
Remove offensive or discriminatory graffiti within 24 hours of it being reported Support and work with you in trying to resolve your complaint
Agree an action plan with you within 2 weeks of you reporting an incident and review this every month
Offer clear advice and support when you report an incident
Use a range of legal and non-legal remedies to resolve anti-social behaviour, taking an approach that is appropriate to the case
Review all open cases after 3 months
If we feel your case should be closed, we will discuss this with you and give you an opportunity to appeal
After your case is closed we will ask for your opinion on how we dealt with the case

From this

http://www.circleanglia.org/customers/site/index.asp?cid=5734&catid=469

You are the victim, so thus they have to take a victim centred approach, if they dont, then time for the ombudsman to get involved. Personally I think the ombudsman HAVE to be involved- surely? Or the housing corporation- who manages housing associations??

summerday

So sorry to hear what you're going through. Not sure what your outstanding mortgage is but if I was you I think I would just sell the property for less than market rate (maybe to one of the BTL brigaders) and move out of London. We live an hour from East London and our house with garden and garage, 3 beds, is worth only £140k. I know you shouldn't have to move, but all the hassle you have had just makes me think life is too short to live how you have had to. I know your dad likes his dr but moving to a stress free place and just a mediocre dr might be more beneficial for his health.

I really do hope that you come to a satisfactory resolution.

sarah x

MascaraMinx

If you are in Tower Hamlets, there is a paper called East End Life run by the council there (I'm sure other boroughs do similar things) you could contact them to cover your story and also the other local rags in the area. Also, contact your Safer Neighbourhood team, contact the MPS Police borough Commander directly (it always helps when someone senior takes an interest), and even go to George Galloway, Ken Livingston, anything to draw attention to your plight.