A pensioner faced with losing her home over a boundary dispute with her neighbour has seen her last-ditch bid to stop the eviction thrown out of court.
Jenny Field, 77, is due to have her £420,000 bungalow seized at the end of the month by bailiffs after losing a five-year legal battle over a 1ft strip of land.
The property in an otherwise quiet cul-de-sac in Poole, Dorset, will then be sold to cover the £113,000 legal bill she owes neighbour Pauline Clark, 64.
Last year a county court judge ruled in favour of Mrs Clark in the drawn out saga over a party fence between their two bungalows.
Ms Field applied to have the decision struck out and the eviction notice against her set aside.
But at Bournemouth County Court, a judge pointed out that she was not legally allowed to make the applications because she was the subject of a limited civil restraint order.
These orders are imposed on a serial litigant like Mrs Field to prevent them making further applications in ongoing legal proceedings without first getting a district judge’s permission.
They are designed to stop frivolous applications and save court time and money.
Jenny Field beside the fence dividing the two neighbours’ properties which is at the centre of the dispute
Pauline Clark, pictured leaving Bournemouth County Court in September, said she had been ‘living a nightmare’
The boundary between Ms Field’s bungalow on the left, and Mrs Clark’s on the right has been at the centre of a five-year dispute
Recorder Richard Paige said without the permission he had no option but to dismiss her applications. Mrs Field now faces eviction in 11 days.
The dispute was centred on the placement of a party fence put up by Mrs Clark in 2020. Grandmother Ms Field claimed her neighbour moved the fence 12ins onto her land when it was installed.
So she hired her own contractors two months later and had the 6ft fence taken down and repositioned to reclaim ‘her land’.
The matter ended up in a protracted civil court case which Mrs Field lost last year.
She was ordered to cover the cost of the fence she took down and two thirds of Mrs Clark’s legal fees, about £21,000 at the time.
But Ms Field refused to accept the outcome and the case has been back before court multiple times since, sending the legal bill skyrocketing to six figures.
She was given a deadline of December 6 last year to pay, before an eviction notice was made when she failed to do so.
Recorder Paige told Ms Field today: ‘You are subject to a limited civil restraint order, in place since June last year.
The bungalows overlook a green boasting mature trees in the quiet cul-de-sac
Jenny Field has vowed to ‘sit tight’ at her house, but bailiffs are now set to evict her
‘You need the permission of a district judge to make an application and no such person has been sought or granted.
‘The applications are automatically struck out, that means I have no jurisdiction to hear these applications. It’s as if they do not exist. There’s absolutely nothing I can do.
‘As I understand it there’s an eviction notice due to be effected on January 26. On that day the high court bailiffs will be able to come to your house, evict you, change the locks and prevent you from re-entering.
‘This is a matter that was determined years ago. You have made repeated attempts to set that aside, none of which has been valid.
‘There is a successful judgement and numerous consequential orders made and also a limited civil restraint order made against you. All those orders are valid, there is no successful appeal, no successful setting aside.
‘It’s legally enforceable, it’s a binding judgement.’
A defiant Ms Field told the judge: ‘It’s my property, on my land. She can’t claim my property on a misrepresented claim. It should never have come to court in the first place.
‘I am not going to be evicted from my home because I have trespassed on my own land, that’s ridiculous.’
She tried to ask what she was supposed to do now but Recorder Paige said he could not give her legal advice.
After the hearing, Ms Field said: ‘I’m going to go to the police and say that she has made a false claim and my property has been damaged.
‘They are just going to have to rip the eviction notice up, she can’t claim property that’s mine.’
Ms Field, a divorcee, bought her three bedroom property in 2016. Mrs Clark bought the next-door property a year earlier.
Mrs Clark said she has undergone private counselling to help her through the ‘horrendous’ situation with her neighbour.
She told the Daily Mail this afternoon: ‘I can’t wait for this ordeal to be over.’
She added: ‘I thought this was all finished after the first court hearing in around 2022 but she (Ms Field) keeps managing to drag it out.
‘She’s been in denial about the whole thing.’
Anna Curtis, Mrs Clark’s solicitor, has previously said there was ample equity in Ms Field’s property for her to pay the debt and still be able to buy a comfortable retirement property mortgage free and and have cash leftover.
In the legal papers previously served on Ms Field, it states that she will be allowed time to move her possessions out on January 26 after the bailiffs turn up.
She has been given advice about speaking to the local council’s housing department to be rehomed and the Citizens Advice Bureau.