neighbours abusive and threatening behaviour

RobAMerc wrote: »

I understand at some level you are trying to justify your own behavior, I understand

You understand very little. I tried to give you friendly advice which was to stop looking for trouble because you will find it, and now you're trying to turn it on me. I am beginning to see why your neighbour thinks you're.. I believe he called you a prick?

RobAMerc wrote: »

So building an extension I was within my rights to do ( council came out and agreed )
My 9 year old got his ball from his garden
I cut the grass outside the house.

I understand at some level you are trying to justify your own behavior, I understand and sympathize - constantly barking dog or lack of sleep would drive anyone nuts

But threatening to kick **** out of someone for cutting the communal grass ?

The only question in your OP was "wtf is wrong with this clown?"

I think almost everyone here has sympathsed with you, and stated that his behaviour was unwarranted and not not normal. But you did ask why he acted the way he did, and people are trying to answer that question. It's not that they're justifying him or anything else - they're hypothesising based on the information you've given them - which is really all they can do.

antix80 wrote: »

So there's 3 reasons why your neighbour hates you.

You have all the sympathy in the world. And no doubt you'll remember something else you or yours did that also received an unwarranted reaction from your neighbour.

Your neighbour sounds like a nut. You probably did the right thing by mentioning him to the gardai. But there are 2 sides to every story, and I'm not overly proud but i was consistently unpleasant to a previous neighbour of mine who made my life a misery by refusing to control her barking dog.

Just keep out of your neighbours hair and see how that works out.

While it's true there are two sides to every story, it doesn't mean both sides are right or justified. Sometimes, one side is actually right and the other side is simply bang out of order.

The way I see it, the OP tried to do a neighbourly thing as he's a decent guy and the neighbours reaction was completely insane and unacceptable. I would hazard a guess that he's annoyed at the kid getting his ball 'from his land' and the extension despite the Council granting permission so even his reasons for being annoyed are ridiculous, unjustified and unstable. A child fetching his ball is about as innocent as it gets! I used to jump my neighbours wall when I was a kid if my ball went in and he'd come out and pretend to chase us. He didn't start threathening my dad and going ballistic!

OP, sorry this is happening to you, you try to do a good deed and this hit gets thrown in your face. You shouldn't have to lay low or feel uncomfortable in your own home. For now, it's been reported, I'd probably leave it there. I wouldn't see the need to tell him you've been to the Guards but if anything else happens, I'd be straight back to them and taking this a step further.

You could also try another route which is swallowing humble pie and being the bigger man and knocking on his door to say look, there seems to be alot of anger and anomosity here, can you talk about what's going on and resolve it.. type of thing.. although he might just get angry for you 'bothering' him 'again'.

Be careful going formal.

Its your word against his, do you have any witnesses to this? If not then chances of it leading anywhere are slim as there is no proof he did it.

You'll piss him off even more, and for what? It's possible he might be "scared" of the garda calling to him. But let's be honest, who's actually afraid of that these days?

The flipsise is that there is a huge a amount of grief you can cause someone well before anything will happen to you if someone wanted. How would you feel if the situation escalated?

If you think he is the sort who will back down if the garda get involved then night be worth doing but doesn't sound like he is.

Tiddlypeeps wrote: »

You'd be surprised how many people think they own a bunch of the land at the front of their house. It's especially common with people thinking they own the street parking in front of their property, causes all sorts of arguments.

Yep.

People are really odd about these things. When we moved in, the entire garden between us and next door was shared. The other neighbour had been cutting the entire thing for years and remarked she was relieved that someone else can do half of it now.
First thing I did was remove half of my side and a flower bed, and replace it with stones, so we could actually park in the driveway and not have to walk in mud.

I should also note that this neighbour is out religiously every week cutting the grass in the summer. Once a week, every week. I have young kids. I might get time to get out and cut it every 2nd week.

So for the most part she was still carrying the load on the front garden. But when I put down the stones, she progressively stopped cutting over our side, further and futher. Until she was leaving half of the garden uncut. Whatever.

Then they asked to build a wall down the front garden. "Oh this is nothing personal, we'd been thinking about it for years, but never had the money!". Sure, whatever.

Still the grass cutting, once a week, every week in the summer. She did the verge out the front. I never bothered because it was never long enough to need cutting.

Then we built an extension. And after a number of very rude and entitled texts from her about it, relations became that bit frostier.

This year I saw that half of the grass verge out front had been left uncut. I do the whole verge when I go out now. I won't get drawn into the petty bullsh1t.

Oddly enough, we share a "parking" space out front, and it's never been a problem. There's an unspoken "first-come" agreement in place, and everyone's cars move often enough not to piss the other side off. Sometimes the space is completely empty because everyone decided to park in the driveways. We've never had a single word said about it to eachother. Funny how things work.


If I was the OP, Id be inclined to assume there's some form of substance abuse at play here to explain the completely off the wall reaction. So I'd be looking to call into the neighbour and time it for when he's not half-cut. The purpose would not be an argument but to try and come to an understanding; because you don't want to spend the rest of your time running in and out hoping not to see him. I'd rather know for definite that I'm on ****ty terms with a neighbour than spend my time hoping not to bump into them. At least then you could actually ignore them without feeling uncomfortable about it.

If it's not substance abuse, then it's mental illness and the Gardai is your only way forward. It's all well and good to say, "Ah sure just keep out of mad Tom's way and nobody will come to any harm", until the day that he comes out and punches one of the kids or kills someone's dog with a shovel. He's a clearly dangerous person, and ignoring him and leaving him be is not the appropriate response. It's the Irish response, but that rarely turns out for the best.

What's wrong with him? Who cares. You certainly shouldn't.

I would ignore him and continue doing what you've always done, what EVERYONE else in the estate does. If he comes out again, completely ignore him. If he screams abuse, go about your business continuing to deliberately ignore him, if he lays a finger on you then give him the hiding he's probably been asking for for years. Pricks like that thrive on indifference. By acquiescing to his abuse you've just enabled him making him think he can abuse you like that and get away with it. You've gotten it reported with the guards, you're not doing anything wrong and ignore this prick until he does something stupid like put a hand on you. A few punches to his head, and the promise of more and he'll never bother you in any meaningful way again. And ignore the violence is not the answer/you could get into trouble rubbish. If he can dangle a footlong weapon in your face acting like a mad man he certainly has it coming. Reporting it will be beneficial as you're obviously not hot headed. Sounds to me like he's been looking for any excuse to have a go at you no matter how negligible or pathetic that excuse was. If not the grass now, it will be the you removing the flowers next....

RobAMerc wrote: »

he'd previously been quite aggressive when he came in to complain about an extension we were building. I agreed to do only what the council allowed, the council were out and we complied with the regs, nothing major. I have tried since to be cordial with him and always say hello. We've had 1 or 2 chats - not much, but I have tried.

you have no choice but to do "only what the council allowed,"