On Wednesday 10th October, we were granted a two-year injunction against someone living in one of our homes, as a result of months of hard work by our dedicated antisocial behaviour team.

The background of this case goes back more than three years, but in just four months, our team has been able to gather witness statements, work very closely with the police and handle the whole process from start to finish in-house, saving Red Kite more than £2,000 and ultimately resulting in a two-year injunction.

As with many antisocial behaviour cases, this particular one was very emotive and unfortunate, involving a Red Kite tenant who had been experiencing domestic assault by someone living in their home but who was not named on the tenancy. The perpetrator had been involved in drug dealing and misuse, as well as playing very loud music and causing various disturbances in the community, which were having a significant negative impact on local residents.

The team first started working with our tenant in June this year as a low-level antisocial behaviour case. We were aware of a number of particularly difficult antisocial behaviour instances, but in the last few weeks, we were advised that our tenant had been a victim of domestic abuse and even more unfortunately, this was not an isolated incident.

What followed was a relentless pursuit of getting written statements from neighbours, encouraging our tenant to provide a statement themselves, producing all the necessary paperwork and working very closely with our colleagues at Thames Valley Police.

Having managed the whole process in-house and not needing to engage with an expensive solicitor, our team obtained a self-represented injunction, to protect our customer who was being assaulted by a family member. The injunction includes a substantial exclusion zone which means that they cannot enter a particular area of the local community and if there is any breach of the conditions, they will be immediately arrested and face time in prison.

Needless to say, local residents are absolutely delighted but more importantly, our tenant is now able to live in a safer environment and get back to enjoying their home again. They also didn’t need to attend court which is a real testament to how we approached this whole case.

This is a great example of how we are determined to do what’s right for our tenants and mean business when it comes to antisocial behaviour. It also demonstrates that we can take serious action against people who are not even Red Kite tenants, as well as not needing to involve solicitors on some occasions, working with the police directly to get the same great outcomes.