Like making a “mountain out of a mole hill." There are some remnant bricks stacked for 5 feet, touching a fence (where only weeds grow), this is not a footpath.
Directly, next to this weeded strip, is a common foot path. A worker passing here, stepped backwards onto this weeded strip to let someone pass and he tripped.
A neighbour who has Dementia and lives 1 house away (but these bricks are not stacked, not at his fence), called on the person who had the bricks there and told her she was responsible for the worker's fall. At the same time, he mentioned to her about having to take the bins out for collection.
This lady told him that bin collectors are striking. He became very aggressive and raised his voice, stating, "I get my email from the council, I know what is happening, don't tell me what to do.”
This Dementia neighbour also went on to call on other neighbours telling them that the worker tripped over the bricks left by Lady X. One of the neighbours replied, "What bricks, they are left on the weeded path, and not on the common path?"
Lady X has spoken to this worker and told him about what the Dementia neighbour said about him tripping.
This worker said he tripped because he stepped backwards to let someone pass, he said he don't want to get involve, regarding what this Dementia neighbour said about him (the worker) tripping backwards.
This Dementia neighbour also left an angry note in lady x's post box, stating that she had lied about clearing the bricks and that she is the problem.
[blimey, it's like one of those Sunday paper puzzles where they give you the narrative and you have to work out how many of the people in the office share a birthday and who's the oldest...]
Lady X has a pile of leftover bricks stacked against her fence, outside her property but not in anybody's way, normally.
Lady X's next-door neighbour observed a public-spirited workman stepping off the public footpath to let someone else pass, and in doing so the workman tripped on the bricks.
The N-DN took it on himself to give Lady X a lecture about this, and at the same time made the point that the bricks obstruct the passage that exists to allow householders in the vicinity to put their bins out (and probably to bring the coals in, and tether their ponies, and all the other sorts of rights of way and easements that turn up in property deeds]. This kind of pathway or route is called an access road, and it probably is required in the freehold deeds that no permanent obstruction is allowed to remain on it. For example, you can open a door or a window or a gate onto it, but you can't park your car or build a lean-to or do anything else that another person can't easily move out of the way. A pile of bricks, against the fence or not, is a continuous obstruction and is not okay. Lady X needs to get them got rid of. The council, when its workers have finished striking, will take them away as a special collection for a small fee. I recommend she cracks on with asking them to do that.
This is not nosiness, and I can't see it has anything to do with dementia. This is about good relations with your neighbours and those are beyond price, believe me.
My thoughts are on the legal issues;
1. Who/what is the owner of the property? Are there "no trespassing" signs posted?
2. If someone stacked bricks on the property that he/she doesn't own, that raises different issues.
3. Was the person who tripped injured? Saw a doctor? Went to the hospital?
4. The person with dementia could be engaging in slander, and subject to legal action, although I doubt that any suit would be sustained in court unless serious injuries were incurred.
5. Personally, dementia might be a factor, but I don't see it as a cause unless there are some underlying personality issues. However, a medical exam would probably have to determine this, unless this is an habitual activity of the individual with dementia.
6. Was this individual someone who meddled in other people's activities before he had dementia? Perhaps he's just nosy.
I'm thankful I don't have neighbors like this. There was a strange experience some years ago though. A young man who had learned how to be a contractor for the county was carrying out work on the next door neighbor's home. Instead of working, though, he was walking back and forth on other neighbors' lawns, bragging that he was a county contractor.
He walked on a next door neighbor's lawn, as well as mine. My concern was more that his ego and arrogance would become a nuisance and he would try to be hired to do work on my house.
I learned later from a good neighbor what happened the next day, when I wasn't home. The wandering contractor wandered onto the lawn of a neighbor who was in love with his lawn, manicured it, pampered it, etc. Apparently this had occurred earlier as well. But this time, the neighbor came out with a gun. My good neighbor told me several police cars arrived in minutes.