Pensioners saddled with £100,000 invoice after taking neighbour to courtroom
- Roger and Margaret Hunt, 80, objected to their neighbours’ Victorian lantern
- The couple, of Deal, Kent, misplaced their enchantment after launching a personal prosecution
Pensioners who spent £100,000 in a failed authorized battle to pressure their neighbours to take away a big lantern have blasted the High Court after shedding their enchantment.
Roger and Margaret Hunt, each 80, launched a personal prosecution towards their neighbours over a Victorian-style lantern, which Mr and Mrs Hunt insist shone into the bed room window of their residence in Deal, Kent.
Frances and Graham Pollard had purchased the previous Methodist college constructing subsequent door to the couple in late 2020, however tensions arose shortly after they moved into the four-bed property.
The Hunts, who stay with their grownup son Jonathan, claimed the Pollards put up the Victorian lantern with the intention to spite them and trigger a nuisance.
After an exhaustive course of, Folkestone Magistrates’ Court and the High Court discovered that the Hunts couldn’t show that the lantern constituted a statutory nuisance.
Roger and Margaret Hunt, each 80, launched a personal prosecution towards their neighbours over a Victorian-style lantern, which Mr and Mrs Hunt insist shone into the bed room window of their residence in Deal, Kent.
Retired police officer Frances Pollard and her husband Graham (pictured) received a courtroom battle after their neighbours took authorized motion over an ornamental lantern exterior their residence
Roger and Margaret Hunt, each 80, complained that the classic gentle exterior the Pollards residence (pictured) was stopping them from sleeping
Mrs Hunt, a retired college trainer, stated as we speak: ‘This is simply us being picked on – we’re fortunate we’ve the means to stay up for ourselves on this case.’
Retired accountant Mr Hunt added: ‘We have been made to pay £6,000 kilos of prices to them after we misplaced the preliminary findings. That could be very uncommon in a statutory nuisance case, you are usually immune.
‘But then once we tried to dispute the magistrates’ findings – the prices racked as much as over £100,000 together with our solicitors.
‘The silly factor is we aren’t that frightened about shedding £75,000 – as a result of we’re extra frightened about what they could do subsequent.’
Their son Jonathan Hunt, who’s in his 40s, was pressured to retire from instructing classics at Winchester College non-public college on account of continual well being points and moved in along with his mother and father in 2012.
Mr and Mrs Hunt stated they concern that the Pollards try to put on them all the way down to the purpose they promote their home.
Their son Jonathan stated: ‘I believe [the Pollards] have an ambition to develop that property. And they see us as being in the best way.
‘I believe that nothing would please our next-door neighbours greater than if we have been to promote our home and depart.
‘There remains to be a boundary dispute between us with the Land Registry and the council. That’s why I believe they need one thing.
‘It’s been working for a yr or so we we have tried to settle it now. It’s nonetheless sitting round. I would not precisely rush into courtroom and do it. But it will not return to courtroom rapidly.
‘We are simply frightened about what’s going to occur subsequent. We do not assume that that is over even after the courtroom motion.
Mrs and Mrs Hunt’s son Jonathan (pictured), who attended the listening to, stated after courtroom: ‘I advised my mother and father not to do that’
The pink home owned by Mr and Mrs Pollard in Deal, Kent
‘Bringing this courtroom motion and lawyering up and spending £35,000 even when the case was discovered of their favour – they’re both mad or they’ve one thing else in thoughts.
Jonathan added: ‘We clearly do not have infinite provides of cash to deliver or defend authorized actions. We haven’t been capable of cease harassing acts like their spotlights being flashed at us and wind chimes being wrung out.
‘Only our solicitors have been capable of get them to cease doing issues they have been doing. But we do not have countless cash and we do not know what to anticipate subsequent. We simply do not perceive them.’
Jonathan additionally slammed the recommendation his household got.
Mr and Mrs Hunt didn’t initially get authorized illustration after studying that their statutory nuisance declare may very well be resolved in courtroom and not using a barrister.
Their son Jonathan stated: ‘Many native councils together with Dover District Council publish recommendation to house owners like us saying if you cannot get pleasure by means of our environmental well being division, they advise peculiar folks like us to deliver statutory nuisance circumstances within the courtroom – and so they say you do not essentially want a lawyer to do that, you’ll get faster reduction.
‘If they’re telling folks, you do not want authorized illustration, that going up towards individuals who have it, then there’s not going to be a good and balanced.’
Further criticising the courtroom course of, Jonathan added: ‘They made my mother and father give their proof orally – they need to have been capable of have their witness statements in entrance of them.
Beside them, Mr and Mrs Hunt stay within the yellow constructing
‘My barrister had an hour with me within the witness field to try to learn the complete criticism from starting to finish and I’m working from reminiscence on the stand with a continual well being situation.
‘I have never labored in ten years and was a litigant in particular person. For my mother and father and me. That’s arduous. It was horrific, really.’
Speaking of the works accomplished because the starting of the dispute, Jonathan added: ‘The lantern creates a form of nice large ball of sunshine over the yard. And it does have an effect on my mother and father’ bed room window.
‘But it is intelligent legally as a result of the sunshine is not shining in a straight line within the window – it bounces off the church on the rear of the property after which off of that.’
The neighbours have feuded over a collection of perceived slights on either side – together with a scuffle on the Hunts’ driveway, which the Pollards have proper of approach over.
The Hunts say they moved into their residence with their son in 2012 to take pleasure in a extra quiet and restful time within the picturesque Kent city.
In a weird twist, they added: ‘We assume the lantern was really first hooked up to our home! There was a widow who downsized from right here to the Pollards’ home and we’ve seen photos on the brochure for this home the place the lantern is on ours.’
