Tenant given ASBO for dog attacks
A tenant who set her dog on parents and children as they walked home from a nearby school has been given a two-year anti-social behaviour order.
Thirty-two-year-old Kelly Jones, of Beechwood Road, Aigburth in Liverpool will not be allowed to walk any dog which is not controlled by a lead in an area of the city.
The Liverpool Mutual Homes resident also trained her Labrador Staffordshire Bull Terrier cross-breed to attack police officers and others wearing fluorescent uniforms during a four-year period of anti-social behaviour.
Steve Coffey, chief executive at LMH, said: ‘We are appalled at the severity of Kelly Jones’ anti-social behaviour and have successfully applied for a two-year ASBO against her.
‘I would like to reassure our tenants and local communities across Liverpool that we are committed to stopping anti-social behaviour and will work tirelessly with our partners to identify and prosecute anyone found to be making other people’s lives a misery.
‘We hope this case gives tenants the confidence to report anti-social behaviour safe in the knowledge that we will act quickly and take a hard, but fair line against perpetrators.’
The ASBO requires Ms Jones not to walk her dog, named ‘Zeko’, without a collar around its neck attached to a lead and muzzle fitted over the dog’s snout in the part of the city named in the order.
In the same zone, she must not have a container of alcohol with the seal broken, other than in licensed premises, be drunk and disorderly or intimidate witnesses.
The court heard Ms Jones and her ‘associates’ are often drunk and fight among themselves in the street using foul and abusive language.
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Readers' comments (10)
Anonymous | 27/05/2010 11:17 am
If this person has such a 'reputation', why is she allowed to keep such a lethal weapon? Wouldn't be safer for all parties concern she was banned from keeping such dogs? Or is that too obvious?
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| 27/05/2010 1:19 pm
And people wonder why other people want to own their homes with social housing now correctly perceived as the housing of last resort, wailing that the doctor no longer lives next to the baker in council owned housing in the manner of times past. Thanks to "needs" based allocation look who have to live next to. This is clear case for an ASB related possession order yet the RSL won't evict. OK the judiciary don't make it easy and that should be addressed but clearly this piece of human garbage should be removed. Just the tip of the iceberg of course which explains the general political consensus that social housing is a complete failure. It shouldn't be but that's the way the system works - or rather doesn't work - now.
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gordon thompson | 27/05/2010 1:48 pm
OK - it may be extreme - but surely this woman should be removed from society. Training a dog to attack officials shows a level of premeditation which is appalling. I sympathise for everyone and anyone who has to live near this individual. It is a mark of our society that the penalty for this woman is an order saying she mustn't do these things - a code which nearly all of us already follow. Where is the punishment exactly? I would much rather her housing as removed completely and a decent tenant put in her place - but then the problem is what would we do with the displaced garbage? How about a penal colony somewhere - we have enough islands around the coutry - surely there is a wet, cold unpleasant one which is far enough off shore where we can deposit all our rubbish - all we would need to do is parachute in occassional basic food supplies and let them do what they like after that. The liberals will say that is not civilised - but is it a mark of a civilised society to allow a small handful of individuals make the majorities lives a misery?
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Rosa Hooses | 27/05/2010 2:05 pm
Gordon,
All you need to add is a camera crew, and I think you've just created a hit Channel 4 TV production.
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Karen C | 27/05/2010 2:47 pm
Erm - how is 4 years of ASB acting fast and coming down hard?
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No win no fee | 27/05/2010 3:00 pm
I agree with Gordon. Surely her actions via the dog effectively entail assault, GBH or even potentially attempted murder ? A few year's imprisonment would seem to commensurate with the crime?
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Joe Halewood | 27/05/2010 3:14 pm
ILAG always blames the needs based allocation system for what he calls 'feral scum.' He also harks back to a golden age that never existed.
Yet what hes fails to say is where would this woman here live? Private housing next door to a council one pehaps?
Moreover, would any new allocation system stop people like this practising these offensive and despicable acts. No it wouldnt!
An allocation system doesnt directly impact on peoples behaviours at all. The only way it can do is if we have very reactionary housing law such as if you train your dog to attack you are automatically evicted. That is a judicial issue and not a housing issue. As eviction and the denial of housing can only be effected by a judge and no one else.
Yes this tenant is horrendous but its her behaviour and actions that are the issue and not the fact she is a tenant or indeed a social tenant. If she was a private tenant or a home owner who would deal with these situations? Oh yes the Police would have to get their fingers out of their backsides wouldnt they!!!
Why the hell should such disgraceful criminal activities be the responsibility of social landlords?
The fact that it is the the fundamental problem that needs addressing.
And as a footnote ILAG would you want Harold Shipman and his like as council tenants? Yes, its not just the working class that can be feral scum is it?
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| 27/05/2010 6:25 pm
Shipman was one off serial killer. What conclusion are you trying to draw? Shipman was a homeowner therefore all serial killers are homeowners? Not sure I buy that one. In terms of a "very reactionary housing law such as if you train your dog to attack you are automatically evicted" not sure why you think this is "reactionary". That's another knee jerk lefty term deployed by lefties against anyone who has an opinion that does not fit with the prevailing Marxist doctrine. It's actually a pretty good idea and not "reactionary" at all. Dog legislation that focuses on the breed of the dog has failed for very good reasons. It's not the dog, it's the owner. Always. Gordon's idea of taking all the scum and housing them in some "wet, cold unpleasant one which is far enough off shore" is also pretty good. The mother of all sink estates on Anthrax Island could be a go-er.
My issue with "needs" based allocation is a valid one. So-called "deprivation" is very often self created and the system is so flawed and perverse that self created deprivation and irresponsibility is rewarded in the social housing system. Such was not the case under the old merit based system. In my experience, it's a fact that the older merit allocated tenants make far better neighbours than the newer needs allocated ones. The lefties screwed it all up with their insistence that officers should be "non-judgemental" (another ghastly Gramsci-esque lefty phrase) about their tenants when exactly what is needed in social housing allocation is precisely the opposite.
Obviously I agree with ASB, ie criminal behaviour, by tenants - or anyone - being the responsibility of the Police, not the RSL, as discussed in forum threads passim.
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Anonymous | 27/05/2010 10:41 pm
What Joe Halewood and Ilag forget is that social landlords have accepted and signed to to a contract with the government to deal and resolve antisoccial issues.
Mention me a single social landlords who will deny this.
Until social landlords withdraw from such an undertaking the police will invevitably say antisocial behaviour, especially amongst and betwixt social tenants, is primarit a social landlord responsibility.
While it should be the police dealing with social issues they cannot be blamed for doings so because of this fact.
The responsibility lies suqrely with the government on who should be the leading agency dealing with antisocial issues. Until that is not made 100% clear police and social landlords will go on playing football with the victims of antisocial behaviour.
why for example decent residents had to endure 4 long years for stopping and putting and end to such a clear cut case?
Far from being a success this case show how much the system is failing good residents and delivering an appalling long drawn unacceptable service.
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| 28/05/2010 1:54 pm
Surely the ASB ball has now formally been passed to the Police? See
http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/analysis/profiles/by-the-book/6504194.article
17/04/2009
"The Home Office ‘policing pledge’, announced last month, gives police the lead role in tackling ASB locally by imposing a single, top-down target on police forces: by 2012, public confidence that ASB and crime are being tackled locally by the police must increase from 42 per cent to 60 per cent. It is, Mr Jackson says, a ‘quite amazing objective’."
Over a year on, nothing seemed to have changed though. Until there is reform of the judiciary nothing will change. Getting a possession order on grounds of ASB needs to be far easier and cheaper for the RSL than at present. The only people who benefit from the current system are the members of the Housing Practitioners Law Association; those highly paid barristers and solicitors who earn their not-insubstantial crust by defending the indefensible in court...
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