from happy to frustrated (long long story)

[sadie]

I had my house built in 1995 in what I thought would be a great country location. A small rural neighborhood. I was so wrong. 2 streets over is a boy who for the past 3 years has rode his ATV from 3:30 pm til sometimes midnight. Weekend are 7am til late in the night. summer is the latter only 7 days a week. He rides thru yards, has done damamge to wells and destroyed lawns. We attempted to do what we thought was right. We spoke in person to his parents (he was 9 when the things got really bad). Got the oh we are so sorry we will talk to him deal. It stopped for a week then it was back to usual. We called them again and asked they tell him to please stay out of our yard with it (trying to compromise). Nada! He continues to ride it all the time......the noise is so bad we have to blare our surround sound just to hear the TV. We have called the police so many time I think they recognize our voice when we call. They drive thru, sometimes they tell the kid to put it away for while other times he must havve a sense or something because 2 minutes after we call he parks it for an hour or til the cops drive thru. Now we have neighbors who have taken up dirt bikes......it will never end. Their yard is so ugly since they have decided to use it as a practice track. Most of the neighbors own dirt bikes or ATV's so banning together to get it stopped is not likely to happen. In fact the 8 yr old next door gets kept home from school to practice or to go to a race. We were then accused of sending out a letter to another neighbor about his property and a fence he put up.please, I have my own neighborhood hell I dont want theirs too. We have put up no trespassing signs as instructed by our county sherriff....the 2 boys have finally stopped taking them down. We are going to try a privacy fence since winning doesnt look like an option. Block out the noise and the unsightly yards next door. Our nextdoor neighbor has recently gotten a dog.........he is kept on a chain in the garage and does his business on the driveway.......they scrape it off and toss it between our houses....lovely smell on a nice day. Hubby spoke to him and told him he needed to move the dog or throw the business somewhere else because it smelled horrible. It has come down to this....when we were calling the police for ligitimate reasons we woke up to vandalism. Our car is all power..right down to the door lock w/ remote...had sand poured all over it which luckily did not go into the doors and into the mechanisms. I actually witnessed it take place. Was ATV boy and dirt bike boy. We cleaned it up and got estimates for repairs mainly to let both sets of parents know what could have happened. We hand delivered nextdoor but certified it to ATV's parents. In that envelope was the cost to have it repaired (detailed and mechanisms cleaned) if that had to be done. we told them we had a friend take the doors apart, check them and clean it.cost was 40.00. we explained that all we wanted was for the boys to spilt the charge each owing 20.00 and an apology...and that I had witnessed it. We got nothing. We have had other vandalism done...we installed security lights. Our local police do not feel that any wrong is being done. All we want is to enjoy our home and our property. Are there laws protecting our rights to enjoy our space? Help me!!! suggest something......anything!!

 

[NYClex]

There is no easy fix in such a situation, because anything you do will probably stoke the fires. But the law does not leave you helpless:
If the situation is that bad, may be you have to roll out the big guns:

Install or get a video camera and record what is going on on your property. If your friendly neighborhood terrorist enters your property he commits trespass. With the video evidence file criminal complaints and a civil lawsuit against him.

You probably also can file a civil lawsuit against those people for nuisance. Any property damage caused by them, file a police complaint and a civil lawsuit against them.

Just make sure you have good evidence. A security camera system installed by a professional might make an impression on the neighborhood.

 

[sadie]

I think a camera is the next step also. Maybe we should invest in one of the night cams...for the vandalism issue.....and a reg one for daytime. Pretty soon the "hood" is going to start calling us Fort Oliver!! I have a fear that when we finally get our privacy fence up there will be vandalism done to that as well. Boy, people have really lost the "way it was when we grew up" life. I am resorting to only calling the police on the "recreation vehicles" til after we have left the neighborhood for oh say 1/2 hour and using my cell phone from the car so they might be confused as to who might have called if I am not home. Boy the means we go thru! Insane! Thanks for your suggestion...I mean that sincerely.