Doberman bites Bailiff on the arse! Police threaten arrest

[DobieGal]

When at work I leave my French doors open to let my two Dobermans into the back garden. It's surrounded by 6 foot fence with a locked gate. The lock to the gate can be picked with a screwdriver but not from the inside once the gate closes.

 

I came home a few weeks ago and found a chewed black size 11 industrial shoe in the garden. It is common for Dobies to steal things and chew them on the lawn, its thier nature but none of my family wears size 11's. I reported fence damage to police where vertical timbers snapped off the above the top Arris rail but they were uninterested suggesting somebody had thrown an old shoe into the garden to torment the dogs. I considered the matter closed because nothing was missing from the house.

 

Last week I am confronted by police officers and a dog catcher making threats of arrest under the Dangerous Dogs act. I quickly pointed out the DDA applies to dogs in public and mine are kept behind locked doors and only to breeds banned under the Act. The officer said a bailiff at A+E reported me for injuries to his legs and backside after entering my garden to collect a court fine. I think bailiffs had opened the gate to approach the house, my two Dobies came bouncing out and bit them on the arse while they climbed back over the fence after the gate slammed shut behind them. I also think this explains the shoe and the fence timbers being snapped off.

 

The court fine is registered at our address but the persons name is unknown to us. The local mags court is unwilling to help citing data protection act. We returned post for the addressee as gone away but items just kept coming and we just put them in the shredder.

 

Can a bailiff really have me charged for this?

[DobieGal]

The courts said they could not disclose information about other people. Our house is on my husband’s farm and the front is hard to reach so post is delivered to the gate lodge. The Dobies were kept in the back garden because it is dangerous for them to ride the combine so we let them out at night to chase away [EDIT] people who try to bring caravans onto the farm. [EDIT] These people register their vehicles at our farm and we get their mail and DVLA tax renewals.

 

We had problems with bailiffs before. Two years ago police arrested my husband when farm hands prepping the potato harvester for the days work at 6.30am had trouble from bailiffs who turned up and levied on the harvester by blocking it with their van. My husband turned up in a JCB forklift and lifted their van by the chassis leaving it suspended 18 feet in the air and ordered the bailiffs off the farm. They called police, but my husband's tactless approach (he is a typical Norfolk f'ing & blinding type – really swears a lot) told the police to go away, arrested him for theft of their van and obstructing a bailiff in levying on his £160,000 Grimme potato picker for a car tax fine that had nothing to do with him or the farm.

 

I can see the funny side, but my husband seriously lacks a sense of humour when it comes to police and bailiffs. He was ready to JCB the police van up and put it up on the roof of a 40ft container. He is a real softie otherwise but this how farmers deal with caravans parked on their land. Police say it's a civil matter even when crop is damaged and livestock is stolen and accordingly my husband has no time for police and bailiffs.

Edited October 7, 2008 by Rooster-UK
Derogatory remarks removed

[DobieGal]

It won't work. When police saw the bailiffs van perched up on the end of a forklift they told my husband he was holding the bailiffs hostage and threatened to charge him with kidnap.

[DobieGal]

Its a peril of living on a farm, [edited], or gypisies for another word, don't have social security numbers or a fixed address so they use other peoples wityhouit permission. We stick tax discs DVLA and insurance documents in the shredder because pikies dont want them, its just to appease the police databases and their laser vans. If a [e] car is lifted by police they just get another. Thats also how pikies dispose of unwanted goods, fill an old untaxed car or van with rubbish and park it out in a neighbourhood for the DVLA to find or drive it through a police checkpoint. Otherwise they flytip it on us. Not just a nuisance but dangerous using planting and harvesting equipment. We can escort a bailiff off the farm, not so easy to escort a five ton pile of rubbish.

 

[e]

Edited October 10, 2008 by jonni2bad

[DobieGal]

Its a case of bailiffs genuinely not knowing their victim (for what better description) is a person of no fixed abode. We cannot lawfully allow anyone to use the farm for DVLA contact because its concealment of the true identity of a vehicles registered keeper and commits an offence of perverting the course of justice.

 

Farms usually have a policy of asking a bailiff to quietly leave the farm (for insurance purposes) and call for assistance if a bailiff causes trouble. We find lifting their vehicle with a JCB and leaving it 30ft in the air usually does the trick.

 

Bailiff visits to the farm usually go unnoticed by us, farmhands explain why they cant find their person or the vehicle and they leave under their own accord.

Edited October 10, 2008 by jonni2bad

[DobieGal]

The police criticised our dog signage. Our house is on a private cul-de-sac of properties on the farm and we own them all. Ours is the principle farm house and the cottages provide accommodation for farmhands. The public road entrance to the cul-de-sac is closed off with electronic gates. That’s why bailiffs cannot get access to the front of the properties and thus, no dog signage needed. The back of the properties each have access direct to the farm via a gate and our dog sign according to police does not comply with Beware of Dog. It is a picture of a Doberman Pinscher with a speech-bubble containing a caption I live here, I bite first and ask questions later!. Bailiffs still entered because the farm house is the address they were looking for, but we never lock the house with my dobies inside.

[DobieGal]

Thanks lulu64uk. My husband has spoken with our company solicitor (yes farmers do have one) about this and a previous incident with bailiffs. A sign beware of dog or dogs running free does not say a dog is dangerous. That's the signage at the entrance to the farm which the bailiffs passed to get to the back of our property.

 

After the consultation he drove into town to personally serve at the police station a hand-written demand for £20 grand. £5 grand for each of the following:

 

a) Making a factually inaccurate statement about the law namely the Dangerous Dogs Act 1991

b) Threatening us with vexatious arrests and falsely arresting my husband in 2006

c) Obstructing a farm in the ordinary course of business and

d) Failure to act at the scene of a crime allowing a bailiff to commit extortion by threatening to take goods namely a potato picker not belonging to a debtor named on paperwork in his possession

 

A bailiff wrote on a document GRIMME POTATO HARVESTER only because farmhands preparing it for the day told him what it was.

 

My husband was kept waiting for 20 minutes at the police station before leaving and head for police divisional HQ and served his letter and bailiff document on the force’s chief constable where they agreed to send an inspector round to see us. Our solicitor will be doing the litigation and will be present to formally ask the police inspector the police pay £20,000.

 

Our solicitor will intervene if police refuse to drop the threat of charges against me within seven days. He says common law means common sense (dog behind locked door) and a court is unlikely to rule otherwise. Even if police retract its threat, the bailiff can sue us in a civil claim but thinks this is unlikely because our counterclaim would negate any benefit. The police don’t have a realistic chance of a successful prosecution and threat of arrest only causes aggravation.

 

On the previous bailiff incident my husband, a Bruce Springsteen with a foul mouth ordered police off his farm citing these adolf hitlers have no right to deprive Waitrose of its Maris Pipers and McDonalds of their French fries, but police responded by arresting him for obstruction and theft. My husband said the officers were having a problem with their ego and he will charge their chief police officer with false arrest and improper interpretation of the law. Until now he didn’t pursue the matter.

 

My husband gave up reporting crime years ago and as with many farmers, have a way with dealing with crime. Last time he reported crime was a stolen wooden gate at a remote end of the farm. Police palmed him off with Victim Support counselling sessions.

 

Our solicitor is making an official complaint against the bailiffs for obstructive behaviour and levying on equipment needed in the ordinary course of business. He thinks the court will probably dismiss because no money changed hands. In any event it would have cost bailiffs more than £170 to move the potato picker off the farm. When lending it to another farm it is transported by road using our ERF and a 38ft low-loader.

 

We wonder what makes policemen tick and why bailiffs have nothing more fulfilling with their lives.

[DobieGal]

We understood NOT having dog warning signs incurs greater liability for dog injury.

 

The dog signs on the farm because our insurance company insists. My husband's border collie is soppy as a wet flannel and stays with him on the farm. My Dobies are kept in the garden because they tend to menace farm workers and only let out on the farm night to keep people in check. It's only a problem if bailiffs calls at night but I don’t think that’s happened.

 

Early one morning about a year ago an unmarked van unknown to us drove onto the farm with two men both smartly suited up in business attire. A Billy goat in the yard dented the van by repeatedly running into the side of it as amused farm workers looked on. Without getting out, the driver u-turned and left and we heard nothing more. Hindsight suggests they were bailiffs. There is no Dangerous Goats Act and there is no liability for the action of livestock on a farm (unless an employee or other person with permission to be on the farm).

 

I think my husband just wants the police to quit their indiscriminate threats of arrest. A bailiff commandeering a £160,000 potato picker and people dumping cars on us is a civil matter. Me keeping dogs in the back garden and my husband clearing vehicles away with a JCB and throwing bailiffs off his farm is criminal. The police are contradicting themselves.

 

I think police ignore their own rules whenever they become inconvenient and solicitors now see it a money-making opportunity.

Edited October 10, 2008 by jonni2bad