Yobs made life miserable!
Sunday 19th October 2008
Have you ever been terrified to set foot outside your own front door? Scared to go to sleep at night in case your car is torched or your house attacked with a petrol bomb? I hope you haven't. Because I know from bitter experience what it's like to be stuck in a living hell.
It was February 2006, and after 11 long years of terror, my husband, Peter, 43, and I had
finally had enough. It'd all started back in 1992, when one of Peter's neighbours had seen some lads breaking into a house. She'd asked Peter if she could use his phone and, afterwards, the rumour had gone round that Peter had grassed.So the yobs had made his life a misery, daubing graffiti on the house and damaging his car.
In the summer of 1995, when I'd moved in with my daughter Lisa, then 3, from a previous relationship, I'd been determined to put a stop to it.Just a couple of weeks later, some thugs had broken into the house while Peter and I were inside.
I'd tried to make a citizen's arrest.
'Stop, I'm calling the police!' I'd yelled at them.
Fat lot of good that did. In fact, after they'd got away scot-free, we just became even more of a target. The list of abuse is so long, I can't even begin to go into it all. Over the next 11 years, we had six cars destroyed, an arson attack on the house, and a petrol bomb thrown through the letterbox. I lost count of the number of times we'd been burgled, and I was even attacked. It was terrifying.
In 1996, we had our glass windows replaced with shatter-proof polybicarbonate, but even when I'd given birth to a little girl, Alex, in January 1999, the nightmare hadn't ended.
So that's why, in October 2002, we took matters into our own hands.
'This'll keep the thugs out,' Peter told me, as he positioned a CCTV camera in our living
room window. If only it was that simple. Just nine months later, I got home from my job as a civil servant to discover even the CCTV camera had been stolen.
'I can't believe it,' I sobbed, when I spotted the yobs lying around in front of our house swigging lager.
'This is thanks to you, love,' one of them sneered.
The bloody cheek. Was he responsible for the theft? No one knew for sure. And when there wasn't enough evidence to press charges, I was devastated.
Which is why, in February 2006, I was preparing to come face to face with the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, to ask him for help. Sounds crazy doesn't it? It's not like asking your mate to do you a favour. But a couple of months earlier, our local newspaper, the Newcastle Evening Chronicle, had run a competition asking readers to suggest how the Government should deal with anti-social behaviour, and I'd entered. I'd been amazed when I'd been invited to go to Downing Street. As I stepped through the big, black front door, my heart was going like the clappers.
We sat down together, and I took a deep breath.
'We've been threatened, we've had six cars written off, our home vandalised and set
on fire, countless burglaries, and I've been attacked,' I said. 'Now, we're £30,000 in debt paying for all the criminal damage.
'We bought the house from the local authority, but we can't even afford to move.'
'This is appalling,' the Prime Minister frowned. 'I don't understand why these people aren't being locked up.'
Whether he'd actually do anything about it remained to be seen. But the next day, my story was all over the papers.
CRIME VICTIMS' ATTACK ON PM, read one headline.
PM MUST HELP THEM, urged another.
Things seemed to be looking up when, a month later, in March 2006, one well-known local yob, Anthony Richard Nicol, 20, was given an Asbo for threatening and intimidating residents. A month later, there was even more good news.
'I'm pregnant,' I smiled to Peter.
'That's great,' he grinned.
Maybe this was just the focus we needed.Of course, nothing had changed on the estate, and
a couple of weeks later, a drink-driver crashed a car into the house next door.
'At least when the baby comes, the council might be able to relocate us,' I sighed.
But just a week on, I woke up with agonising stomach pains. As I raced to the loo, I saw blood oozing from between my legs.
'I've lost the baby,' I sobbed.
'You can't have,' Peter gasped.
But a doctor at the hospital confirmed I'd had a miscarriage. Back at home that night,
I couldn't stop crying.
'It's the stress of living here,' I cried to Peter. 'I can't bear it.'
A week later, it all got too much. Losing my baby was pain like I'd never felt before.
Surely, if I was dead, my family would get some money to help them escape the yobs…
So one evening, while Peter was upstairs, I sat in the kitchen and downed a handful of paracetamol tablets. Luckily, Peter came in and found me.
'What are you doing?' he shouted, snatching the bottle off me.
He rushed me to Newcastle General Hospital.
But I was still miserable. Over the next nine months, I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. I even went on a 36-hour hunger strike to try to get help. Then, finally, in March 2007, the police came to see us.
'Some members of a local gang are being released from prison,' the officer explained.
'We've reason to believe you'll be targeted. We can offer you police protection, but perhaps you should think of moving.'
We had the kids to think of.
'We've got to move,' I said to Peter. 'Even if it bankrupts us.'
Peter nodded, tears in his eyes. A couple of days later, we put the house up for auction and found a four-bedroom terrace that was up for sale in the same auction. And as soon as the deal went through, we started packing. But first, I sat the kids down.
'We're moving,' I said. 'But you're not to tell anyone where we're going.'
We had to be so careful about anyone finding out where we were moving to. Every morning, I'd be up at the crack of dawn packing stuff into my car, then driving it to a storage unit out of town.
On 14 May 2007, we piled into the car and drove an indirect route to our new home. As we pulled up outside, I felt my whole body sag with relief.
'We made it,' I sighed.
It had taken 12 years of utter hell, heartbreak and a face-to-face with the Prime Minister but, finally, we were about to start afresh. Now, 17 months on, I couldn't be happier. Compared with what we were used to, our new home is heaven. Some people might say we ran away from the yobs. But I did everything in my power to change things, and my fight won't end here. I'll continue to campaign for tougher action on yobs in the hope that, one day, people won't be afraid to step outside their front doors any more.