A ‘perfectly respectable’ 81-year-old woman has been fined after she attacked a neighbour in a row over where she parked her car.
Mobile footage showed Eunice Day storming over to the home of Suzanne Webb, who is in her 60s, and reaching through the window to knock her phone out of her hand.
Trouble started soon after Day moved into a rented bungalow in Mountbatten Drive, a normally sleepy cul-de-sac in Ferndown, Dorset.
She parked her Audi on a communal grass verge for several weeks, preventing her neighbours from mowing the grass.
Suzanne asked her if she would move the vehicle so the maintenance could be carried out, but Day told her that she could ‘park wherever I like”
Neighbourly relations further deteriorated after Day blocked a private footpath with her wheelie bin, as well as sitting outside her bungalow on her mobility scooter in what was described as an attempt to intimidate other residents.
Tensions finally reached breaking point when a group of five frustrated neighbours complained to Day’s letting agent, leading to the incident on June 20 that was recorded by Suzanne.
Day said she thought the phone in Suzanne’s hand was actually a knife and she was trying to bat it out of her hand.
Police were called and Day was charged with assaulting Suzanne, whose six-year-old granddaughter was in the house at the time.
Prosecutor Jason Spelman said the video taken by Mrs Webb showed ‘it was never going to be a friendly visit.’
He added: ‘You cannot hear Mrs Webb saying anything aggressively [and] the suggestion that the complainant had a knife is ridiculous.’
Michael McGhie, defending, described his client as ‘a perfectly respectable woman who worked in business her whole life.’
He added: ‘My client has had a number of recent eye operations and she was under the impression that a knife came towards her.
‘It was actually a phone but she made a split second decision to defend herself.’
Magistrates nevertheless found Ms Day guilty of assault. She received a conditional discharge and was ordered to pay £646 in costs.
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2023-03-20T15:02:17Z dg43tfdfdgfd