‘Bunnings Karen’, dog attackers, kidnap plotters: Melbourne’s worst neighbours revealed
Unlucky homeowners somewhere in Melbourne’s southeast must be enduring a nightmare living just doors down from dramatic anti-masker ‘Bunnings Karen’. But there’s plenty of other hellish neighbours Melburnians have had to endure.
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Everybody needs good neighbours.
But some Melburnians have drawn the short straw, with the smiles and rainbows on Ramsay St a far cry from the hellish reality they’re forced to deal with.
From dog attackers, to kidnap plotters, full-blown feuds and even Bunnings Karen, here are some of Melbourne’s worst neighbours.
THE CONSPIRATOR
Unlucky homeowners somewhere in Melbourne’s southeast must be enduring a nightmare living just doors down from ‘Bunnings Karen’, less commonly known as Kerry Nash.
The dramatic anti-masker cried she would sue police after being “assaulted” during her tirade at the hardware chain car park last month.
Herald Sun reporters were met with a legal threat at her door but got chatting to Ms Nash’s neighbours who said her outburst was “nothing new”.
They said police had been called on Ms Nash for her frequent parties and loud music, while the fire brigade had attended for her big backyard bonfires.
“This is nothing new for her, she is always banging on about how she’s gonna sue police and always argues with them,” one neighbour said.
“She acts all tough and goes on and on about all that law s*** and her human rights.”
THE CREEP
A Heidelberg Heights man left his female neighbour “terrified” after allegedly hurling two concrete blocks at her car in a series of strange attacks.
Anthony Duff allegedly walked out of his Milton Crescent home and threw two concrete cinder blocks at the woman’s car, smashing the back window and passenger front window about 8.40am on July 4.
The woman and her mother ran outside and saw him laughing, before the woman allegedly asked “what are you doing?”.
He allegedly “flipped her off” and went back into his home, before coming back outside carrying a cup of tea and a plank of wood.
He allegedly stood and smiled at the woman while holding the plank until she went inside and phoned 000.
Magistrate Denise Livingstone said the alleged offending was serious and would have been “terrifying” for the woman.
Duff refused to plead guilty after Ms Livingstone indicated she would sentence him to four months’ jail for the charges, of which he had already served 35 days.
Ms Livingstone said a much longer sentence would have been appropriate for the charges for deterrence reasons if Duff didn’t suffer from his particular health problems.
THE SILENT ASSASSIN
Tensions are no doubt running high during the coronavirus crisis, forcing one Croydon resident to snap in April after their sound of silence was swapped with the sound of a neighbouring tradie’s sanding.
“Hello, there are a lot of us trying to work from home at the moment and your very high pitched continual sanding is becoming an issue,” the resident’s note, left in the man’s letterbox, read.
“This has gone on for weeks now. Can it please come to an end?”
But the hard working recipient dared the mystery local to talk to the hand(yman).
The sassy sander wrote a reply and taped it to his mailbox for the rest of the suburb to see.
He slashed out the word ‘neighbour’ which the author used to sign off and replaced it with ‘anonymous’.
“Next time have some guts and sign your name,” he snarled.
THE WATER WASTER
A Current Affair reporter ended up soaking wet courtesy of garden hose trigger happy public housing tenants embroiled in a classic neighbourhood showdown in Blackburn.
Sam Cucchiara was covering a story involving public housing tenants on one side of the street and a disability pensioner on the other in January.
Margaret Stokes, 59, told the program she was terrified of her neighbours and too scared to leave the house.
“I would not be surprised if they killed us,” she said.
When Cucchiara and the camera crew approached Margaret’s neighbours, he was met by several youths with a garden hose who unleashed their wrath, saturating his suit from top to bottom.
“What are you doing with the hose,” Cucchiara asked.
“Excuse me, sir. What are you doing? Do you think you own the street? … So you guys are being bullies to your neighbours and now you’re hosing us down?”
THE PARTY ANIMAL
The party was over for eight-year-old Oscar, of Beaumaris, in April, with outraged residents appalled at the behaviour of their stage 3 rule breaking neighbours.
To jog your memory, easy breezy stage 3 was when people were prohibited from gathering in groups of more than two, apart from the people they live with.
The little boy’s parents were slapped with a $1652 penalty for organising the party, where a ‘this way to Oscar’s party’ sign was sprawled across the front fence.
Photos of the party showed a large group of people close together outside a double-storey house decorated with balloons, colourful bunting and posters.
Shocked neighbours dobbed the “arrogant” partygoers into police who busted up the party and fined the organiser.
Witnesses reported the street was packed with cars of guests and that they had spilt onto the street from a cafe opposite the home.
They said more than 20 partygoers were seen outside the house.
THE BAD FRUIT
A former fruiterer hellbent on hurting his barber nemesis at Toorak Village was jailed for 11 years in August after his kidnap conspiracy was uncovered by chance.
Federal police were closing in on Melbourne drug kingpin Feres Al Janabe when they uncovered a bizarre kidnap plot sprung from The Villagewalk Cafe owner Shadi Farah.
Al Janabe had been hired by Farah — who previously owned The Fruitful Shop — in 2018 to kidnap his barber neighbour and nemesis Nader Kajajo, owner of Toorak Prestige Barber.
Al Janabe was recorded telling Farah that Mr Kajajo “won’t be able to hold scissors in his hand any more” when he was finished with him.
Mr Kajajo told Leader the situation became so intense he “had to move house to keep myself safe and my girlfriend and her children safe”.
“My business suffered because the clients they didn’t come, they didn’t feel safe,” he said.
Al Janabe, 43, was sentenced in August 2019 to a maximum of 11 years and 10 months in prison with a non-parole period of eight years.
THE BARKING MAD
A heartless hound hater who stabbed a dog in the face because it kept barking walked free from court despite the senseless attack.
Doveton resident Alan Erskine was “frustrated” at his neighbour’s staffordshire bull terrier cross mastiff’s barking, so he stabbed it in the face three times while its owner was away in July last year.
The Dandenong Magistrates Court heard the man had complained about his neighbour’s dog to Casey Council three times between April and July last year, but when asked to keep a barking diary, he refused.
On June 10 last year he sent an email to the council saying “either you shut that (dog) up or I will”.
On July 13 last year Endeavour Hills’ police received a phone call from Erskine stating he had injured the dog, saying “he had done something terrible”.
Magistrate Jack Vandersteen said the only reasons Erskine was not being jailed was because he was the one who alerted authorities and he had accepted responsibility.
He said if he had not pleaded guilty, he would have jailed him for four months.
“The dog was vulnerable and in an enclosed area,” Mr Vandersteen said.
“You cut that dog to the face three times.
“You took matters into your own hands out of sheer frustration.”
Erskine was given an 18-month community corrections order and was made to complete 250 hours of unpaid work as well as fork out $3681 in compensation.
He was convicted and banned from owning any animal for three years.
The dog survived after being rushed to an emergency vet clinic, and still lives next door to her attacker.
THE VICIOUS
An ongoing feud between two Ivanhoe households turned extreme when a man stabbed his neighbour in the middle of the night.
Attacker Alexander Jelic was jailed on August 20 this year as a result of the January 29 2019 dispute, where he pulled a knife on his Shortford Ave neighbour after they threw glasses at each other outside.
Jelic and the man got into a physical fight, falling to the ground, with the man holding his knee on Jelic’s chest but not actually hitting him, before Jelic’s mother broke up the fight.
The court heard when the man got home he felt wet and realised he had been stabbed multiple times in his back and abdomen.
Jelic’s lawyer said the stabbing occurred in the context of both parties being in the wrong, and that the victim had only incurred minor lacerations.
His client was jailed for a year.
THE TURF GUARD
A Melton South couple were lucky to survive after their unruly neighbour shot at them when he was asked not to park on their nature strip.
Brodie Cooper, 29, was jailed for four years on December 18 last year with a minimum of two years and nine months, over the Moss St incident.
Cooper was confronted by his neighbour Sarah Reynolds just after 9am on May 23, 2018.
She was angry Cooper had again parked on their nature strip.
Ms Reynolds — upset after the confrontation — rang her partner, Jason Lee, and asked him to leave work and return home.
The couple had been “experiencing difficulties” with their neighbours over rubbish, noise and parking on the nature strip in the fortnight leading up to the confrontation, the court heard.
Mr Lee arrived home, armed himself with a hammer and fought Cooper.
He and Ms Reynolds returned home after the fight was broken up but Cooper wasn’t done with.
Cooper — who has a face tattoo “Dead men tell no tails (sic)” — went to the garage at the rear of his home and re-emerged with a rifle.
He then marched next door with the weapon and pointed it at Ms Reynolds and Mr Lee.
Ms Reynolds told her partner to go inside but Mr Lee dared Cooper to shoot.
Mr Lee closed his eyes in “anticipation” but laughed after Cooper failed to shoot.
This angered Cooper who gritted his teeth, lowered the gun and fired a shot into the driveway near Mr Lee’s feet.
Concrete fragments struck Mr Lee’s leg but there were no other reports of injuries.
brittany.goldsmith@news.com.au
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