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The situation.

Three recovering mental health patients are sharing a house. The last to join the household (R) moved in during May 2007. He is a tee-total, non smoker with a healthy lifestyle.

The residence is a newly built semi-detached house with shared kitchen, lounge, bathroom and toilets.

The following pages document some of the conditions created by the two clients already in occupation.  

The two other residents (T & S) are chain smokers and indulge in this habit throughout the house. Apparently there is nothing the landlords can do about this so that R cannot use any of the shared facilities owing to the general filth and choking stench of tobacco smoke, stale bodies and dirty clothes. In addition S is a self confessed recreational drug user and T is an alcoholic who is often incoherent by mid-day.

Other worrying incidents include various acts of vandalism, such as the theft of the pay phone, permanent damage to the new phone which eventually replaced the first one, drawing on the walls, holes cut in the lounge carpet and the opening and destruction of other peoples mail.

Recently, there was a bad atmosphere between T and S so R left the premises to stay the night with relatives. That evening the police had to be called to the house to deal with a violent incident.

Sometime in February 2008, just after dawn R was awakened by someone shouting and kicking his door. As usual S had left the back door unlocked and one of his drug suppliers had entered the house uninvited, found the wrong bedroom and demanded access to deliver drugs and, presumably, obtain some cash. Neither S nor T made any attempt to intervene so R was left to guard his door from the inside whilst the unknown intruder shouted threats and kicked the door for 20 minutes or more. Eventually the interloper left and has never been identified.

A few weeks after the last incident there was another threatening intrusion, this time at 3am in the morning. Again, as usual, S had left the house unlocked (he regularly loses his keys so keeps all the doors unlocked even if they are secured by the other residents) and someone let himself in to stand outside T's bedroom door to kick it and make violent threats to kill T by stabbing him.  Again S or T made no attempt to deal with the intruder who eventually left.

I relate the last two incidents to emphasise the lack of privacy and security in the building. Acquaintances of S and T regard the house as public property and roam around uninvited at any time, night or day.