Boat Trespasser

[tree]

IMO I think that maybe the situation would have been a bit different during the light of day, with a more common reaction to be ' excuse me, but this boat is Private Property and maybe advice given to fish elsewhere. But in the dark of night, then once again IMO the situation changes from ... cheeky sod lol to shock and a bit of fear, fight or flight sydrome !!!

 

I am a most gentle creature and avoid confrontation where I can, but that doesnt mean to say that certain situations from other people acts, dont affect my human nature lol

 

I remember a similar thread where I posted about the time when 2 Grown Men had jumped over into my garden late at night and my daughter called me quite scared at the time, I told her to call the police and tell them that we were on our own and the situtation. It seemed an age and we could still hear them rumaging around, well to be honest I lost it, grabbed a big stick shouted out in garden ' You had better move or words to that affect cos ime going to get my axe, I then called the police and told them to get here right now as I was going to go get them, admittedly I was so so angry as my daughter was so scared, how dare FOLks think that they can do what they please !! well the police arrived in no time with 2 police cars and a van. They did inform me that I WOULD be the ONE in trouble if I had hit one of them and I replied ok ! fair enough but I WOULD gladly go to court and defend myself. The men were caught and said they were just messing around grrrr...

 

I am not advocating violence by any means all I am saying is when your put into a situation like that, some of us react in a different way. Plus they only moved pretty quickly into next doors garden by smashing a fence panel ,AFTER they heard me say that I had an axe.

 

p.s. erm... no it wasnt a case of pmt lol just incase any of you chaps are thinking that I was just protecting my daughter and myself and my property. Yes! in this case all ended well, but if at any time I thought that I could not handle the situation, I would have just locked us in the house and waited for the eventual ( took ages the first time for the police). You do have to quickly weigh up the situation and know when to back off, but I wont be a victim for anybody. If talking them into submission LOL doesnt work then hve to think of alternative solutions

[Canal Rat]

Interesting reading this is. All I can say is on my list of things to do in this situation, calling the police would be on the back at the bottom, scribbled in pencil as an after thought .....

 

Time for another

[Tuscan]

IMO I think that maybe the situation would have been a bit different during the light of day, with a more common reaction to be ' excuse me, but this boat is Private Property and maybe advice given to fish elsewhere. But in the dark of night, then once again IMO the situation changes from ... cheeky sod lol to shock and a bit of fear, fight or flight sydrome !!!

 

I am a most gentle creature and avoid confrontation where I can, but that doesnt mean to say that certain situations from other people acts, dont affect my human nature lol

 

I remember a similar thread where I posted about the time when 2 Grown Men had jumped over into my garden late at night and my daughter called me quite scared at the time, I told her to call the police and tell them that we were on our own and the situtation. It seemed an age and we could still hear them rumaging around, well to be honest I lost it, grabbed a big stick shouted out in garden ' You had better move or words to that affect cos ime going to get my axe, I then called the police and told them to get here right now as I was going to go get them, admittedly I was so so angry as my daughter was so scared, how dare FOLks think that they can do what they please !! well the police arrived in no time with 2 police cars and a van. They did inform me that I WOULD be the ONE in trouble if I had hit one of them and I replied ok ! fair enough but I WOULD gladly go to court and defend myself. The men were caught and said they were just messing around grrrr...

 

I am not advocating violence by any means all I am saying is when your put into a situation like that, some of us react in a different way. Plus they only moved pretty quickly into next doors garden by smashing a fence panel ,AFTER they heard me say that I had an axe.

 

p.s. erm... no it wasnt a case of pmt lol just incase any of you chaps are thinking that I was just protecting my daughter and myself and my property. Yes! in this case all ended well, but if at any time I thought that I could not handle the situation, I would have just locked us in the house and waited for the eventual ( took ages the first time for the police). You do have to quickly weigh up the situation and know when to back off, but I wont be a victim for anybody. If talking them into submission LOL doesnt work then hve to think of alternative solutions

 

 

 

 

 

 

A very good post, it's also I think the only way to get the police to extract a digit.

[FrigateCaptain]

To be honest, a .22 air rifle is pretty useless against a human unless it was a very lucky/unlucky shot, mine are kept locked so I don't make a costly, pointless mistake in the heat of the moment.

I have found chasing scrotes up the towpath in me boxers armed with a axe very effective in the past though

[Pen n Ink]

Deleted : numpty numpty!

Edited September 4, 2012 by Pen n Ink

[mayalld]

Yello,

 

@ Starcoaster ..... yes Me Julie did try to call the police after the event. After the event means it's not an emergency, therefore you're asked to dial another number which Me Julie's mobile tariff would not let her do.

 

 

After your ejection of the intruder, he had returned with another person, who was threatening, and when they departed you still felt that there was a real prospect that they would return to do you harm, to the extent that you felt it necessary to arm yourself and stay up all night.

 

That doesn't read like "after the event" to me, and calling 999 would seem to be an appropriate response.

 

So far as your handling of the immediate incident is concerned;

 

It is all too easy to pontificate from the keyboard, when not actually faced with the issue, and I can't hand-on-heart say that I would have done much different there.

 

Possibly I would have made sure that he buggered off WITH his kit, because (regardless of the rights and wrongs of his presence) having to return to try to recover his kit is very likely to inflame the situation.

 

In the aftermath, then absent police involvement, I would probably have stayed up, and would have known where the tiller arm was, but the Air Rifle is just a complete no-no. If, when faced with a situation like this, you actually get the air rifle out (even for show), then you very seriously need to get rid of the thing today.

[luctor et emergo]

To be honest, a .22 air rifle is pretty useless against a human unless it was a very lucky/unlucky shot, mine are kept locked so I don't make a costly, pointless mistake in the heat of the moment.

I have found chasing scrotes up the towpath in me boxers armed with a axe very effective in the past though

 

 

In a situation like this, the most use you would get out of an air rifle, is to use it as a club. A purpose for which it is wholy unsuitable (as is the UZI, but that is a different story). Keeeping air rifles locked away is the best way to keep them.

I have to agree with Dave M here, if you got the rifle out in this instance, for this purpose, perhaps you need to re-consider your ownership. That is not to say that I don't agree with the rest of your sentiment. But better to invest in a Billy Hook. It's a tool, afteral, in frequent use to make kindling, for my fire.... (what officer, the wrist strap? It's not a wrist strap Sir, it's a lanyard. That is so that I don't drop it in the canal )

[Kessy]

Enter at your peril !

 

 

( Unless you have a packet of Custard Cream bicuits )

 

Edited September 4, 2012 by Kessy

[c c]

I would have simple dialed 999 and watched and waited for the cops to do their job. Simples

 

Whilst in the real world, the emergency service operator would classify that 999 call as Category 3 - non-urgent - which where we are moored, means the Police may turn up a week on Thursday, if at all! Would you seriously just sit and wait for them whilst your boat is occupied and plundered?

[luctor et emergo]

Whilst in the real world, the emergency service operator would classify that 999 call as Category 3 - non-urgent - which where we are moored, means the Police may turn up a week on Thursday, if at all! Would you seriously just sit and wait for them whilst your boat is occupied and plundered?

 

 

Now to be fair, nobody mentioned plundering. Or pilaging.. or rape. He was only a lad, not a Viking.

[nicknorman]

Reading the OP there was a fair bit of over-reaction IMHO. It is irritating to find someone invading your space, but one has to bear in mind that the concept of personal space is a cultural one, with different cultures having different ideas about it. In this case, the lad is probably not accustomed to the concept of a private leisure boat/floating home and regarded it much as we might do a piece of agricultural equipment in a field - fair game to sit on etc.

 

It seems the lad did apologise and at that point, once you had realised he was not a burglar, I would just have politely but firmly asked him to leave (he would probably have done that anyway) pointing out that this is your home. As it is, by declaring WW2 on him you will have left him with a very bad taste about boaters which will influence how he thinks about and behaves towards other boaters.

 

He made an error of judgement and briefly scared you, but that is not really crime of the century and raise your hand all those who have never made an error of judgement in their lives! Education is so much better than agression.

[KenK]

I've just finished one of Steve Haywoods books, he apparently had the same problem, although not at night and the fisherman was English. It appears that Steve had moored his boat in the fishermans favourite spot, so the fisherman used his boat to fish from. He was only removed after Steve unmoored his boat and started the engine, very funny in the book probably not so in the dead of night.

 

Ken

[nb Innisfree]

After having our garage burgled and all my tools stolen I fixed up an IR alarm and kept a baseball bat in our bedroom. Sure enough a few weeks later the alarm went off and after looking out of the window I saw someone with a large dog creeping around, bastard! I grabbed the bat and went outside in a semi naked murderous rage, weeks of pent up anger came rushing out as I met the intruder coming round the corner. Don't know what went through the mind of the startled police dog handler but the dog looked terrified

 

Took me quite a while to calm down, appeared the police had received a call about an intruder but were at the wrong address

[Leonie]

I would have died of a heart attack to find that scenario unfolding on my boat. I would have acted agressively in fear and then spent a sleepless night waiting for the 'fishermen' to return. Returning to my boat at 4pm in the dark depths of winter can be scary, returning at 1am after a night out with a bit of booze under my belt can be terrifying. I can't even imagine the sensation of finding someone on board.

 

With hindsight, you can say that it was probably an overreaction on the part of the OP however I'm sure it's an overreaction I'd make under the same circumstances only I don't (and will never) own a gun.

[Zayna]

This is what our country -and indeed, the World - has come to though. There are that many bad buggers around, the first thing you do when you see someone hanging around is go on the attack, figure of speech, not necessarily literally. The guy was fishing, probably thought the boat was unoccupied so chose a dry place rather than a damp (and dog poopy) bank? Perhaps? Not judging, just want to tell you a little story... (RIP M. Bygraves)

 

About 20 years ago my late brother and I, and our partners, went on holiday to Cyprus, we used to live there as children when my dad was in the R.A.F.

 

We decided to go and find the house where we lived as kids and sure enough we found it. We started taking photos, and sat on the garden wall for the pictures, had a good look around the outside of the house (we didn't go in the garden though). Then the owner came out, a Greek chap who couldn't speak much English. I thought we were in trouble for snooping. He wanted to know what we were doing, so we explained we had lived there as children, showed him a black and white photo of the house with us sitting on the steps, as 3 and 7 year olds.

 

He invited us in, made us coffee, and showed us round the house. Not only that, he insisted we came back the following week to meet his family. We did, and not only did we meet his family, he'd put on a barbeque, his brothers and cousins were there and could not wait to meet us, they treated us like celebrities. It was a party in our honour.

 

Now. If the boot had been on the other foot and he and his family had been snooping round our house in the UK, taking photos, would we have invited them in for a coffee and put a barbeque party on for them?

 

If only.

[bizzard]

The deserter;,--.

Many moons ago i owned an old ex P&O ships lifeboat moored on the muddy foreshore at Leigh-on-Sea which i converted by constructing a cabin on it.

Arriving there one sunny Sunday morning with my girl friend we clambered aboard to discover the doors padlock and hasp had been forced, oh well i thought this was quite a common occurrence around those parts at the time, so after a whispered discussion with my goyl we decided that whoever had done it would be long gone, and as she was more beefy than i sent her in to make tea while i nipped over the side to examine the propeller.

My propeller inspection was suddenly interrupted not by the kettle whistling which would have been music to the ear but by a loud scream, scrambling back aboard i reached for my big shiny panel saw and rushed into the cabin flexing and warping it to make that warping noise like Rolf Harris's wobble board, the most frightening and threatening looking weapon i know of.

At my table sat a soldier in uniform, with an empty pineapple tin and spoon before him, the only edible thing left on the boat, ''the pineapple not the tin'', he'd scoffed the lot, but looked quite inoffensive ''more frightened like''and just sat cowering there in the overwhelming shadow of my goyl about to bash him on the bonce with the kettle, ''she was beefy''.

After laying down my saw, getting the kettle back on and calming him down we sat around the table discussing his problem. He'd deserted from the army the day before and had forced entry into my boat mainly to hide and for shelter. He thought i was the police or military police turning up to fetch him back, we felt sorry for him.

After we'd all had tea i dispatched him on his way with a half crown to buy me another tin of pineapple ''i like pineapple'' knowing he wouldn't be back which he didn't, probably bought fags with the half crown anyway.

He'd caused no damage, apart from the padlock hasp and had made no attempt to steel anything and showed no sign of aggression at all, only fright, so they you are, the true tale of the deserter that ate my desert. I didn't bother further with the propeller inspection.

[nb Innisfree]

This is what our country -and indeed, the World - has come to though. There are that many bad buggers around, the first thing you do when you see someone hanging around is go on the attack, figure of speech, not necessarily literally. The guy was fishing, probably thought the boat was unoccupied so chose a dry place rather than a damp (and dog poopy) bank? Perhaps? Not judging, just want to tell you a little story... (RIP M. Bygraves)

 

About 20 years ago my late brother and I, and our partners, went on holiday to Cyprus, we used to live there as children when my dad was in the R.A.F.

 

We decided to go and find the house where we lived as kids and sure enough we found it. We started taking photos, and sat on the garden wall for the pictures, had a good look around the outside of the house (we didn't go in the garden though). Then the owner came out, a Greek chap who couldn't speak much English. I thought we were in trouble for snooping. He wanted to know what we were doing, so we explained we had lived there as children, showed him a black and white photo of the house with us sitting on the steps, as 3 and 7 year olds.

 

He invited us in, made us coffee, and showed us round the house. Not only that, he insisted we came back the following week to meet his family. We did, and not only did we meet his family, he'd put on a barbeque, his brothers and cousins were there and could not wait to meet us, they treated us like celebrities. It was a party in our honour.

 

Now. If the boot had been on the other foot and he and his family had been snooping round our house in the UK, taking photos, would we have invited them in for a coffee and put a barbeque party on for them?

 

If only.

 

Well I know I would have, minus the barbie perhaps as we don't use them, but I would have welcomed the opportunity to make friends, I'm sure there are many others like me.

[c c]

Now to be fair, nobody mentioned plundering. Or pilaging.. or rape. He was only a lad, not a Viking.

Sorry, I was responding to the phrase "an intruder in my property" and the idea of dialing 999.

[Chris Pink]

..

Edited September 4, 2012 by Chris Pink

[Serenity Malc]

Yello,

Well thanks to all who replied to my 'trespassing event'....

Your thoughts have made me think carefully about my reaction / over reaction on that night. It's true to say that we'd had a great night out and alcohol had been consumed. My reaction in daylight would have been considerably different, but the fact of the time of day and the remoteness of our mooring played a part. Plus we couldn't just move on to another mooring. We did consider that, but in the pitch black on The Thames without another available space made it a non starter.

My air rifle was a gift from an ex army friend years ago .... it's not been used by me. BUT .... when faced with an unknown threat in that situation, it was included in my deterent plan.

I definately don't want to appear as a gun toting yob on this forum ..... that's so much not the case.

Happy days ..... Malc and Me Julie.

[Zayna]

I don't want my post to come over as saying you should trust all trespassers and indeed put the kettle on and cut them a piece of Madeira cake, I would have been scared to death in the circumstances and can't say what I would have done.

I just wish we didn't have to be this way.

[mrsmelly]

[quote name='Serenity Malc' timestamp='1346703675' post='933201']
Yello,

On the last night of our recent trip holiday cruise, we went to see a fine band called 'Bad Influence' at The Poinz in East Molesey on The Thames. A good gig .... BUT .... on arriving back to our barge moored at Hampton Court at 1am, I discovered an intruder on the deck. Thinking that he was in the act of burgling my home I took an aggressively defensive attitude to him ! It was after a short moment or two of collaring him and asking WTF he was doing on my boat at this time in the morning, I discovered he was fishing off my barge and had laid all his kit out over the roof. He was about 17 years old and had only a couple of words of English to his vocabulary .... "I'm sorry" and " my Uncle", and a very obviously Eastern European accent.

It would have taken no more than a shove for him to have been floating down The Thames into Molesey weir ..... but being a man of alledgedly reasonable character, I sent him on his way with a big F*ck O** ..... minus most of his tackle.

I then laid his fishing rods and tackle out on the bank and waited.

Sure enough his uncle came around with him and an aggressive attitude about 30 minutes later, asking why I'd scared his cousin ?

WTF !!! ..... the little trespassing tw*t was very lucky to get away without a long, fast swim .... and he even got his tackle back !

Nevertheless it made for an uneccessary early morning vigil with camera, air rifle and tiller arm at hand, to ensure my barge was safe from a mob handed attack from his East European brothers.

This was in Hampton Court .... a respectable place I hold dear and love to bits ....

What is the world coming to ?

Malc.
[/quote]

Hampton court........If you will boat/moor in the crime capital of this country what do you expect ?

Tim

[Ange]

[quote name='mrsmelly' timestamp='1346756789' post='933533']
Hampton court........If you will boat/moor in the crime capital of this country what do you expect ?

Tim
[/quote]

I thought that was Nottingham - or it the gun capital?

[carlt]

[quote name='Kessy' timestamp='1346746742' post='933442']
Enter at your peril !


( Unless you have a packet of Custard Cream bicuits )

[IMG]http://i1199.photobucket.com/albums/aa468/Vernon_Steadman/DSCF1334.jpg[/IMG]
[/quote]
Some would treat that as an invitation.

[url="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/man-guilty-of-having-sex-with-exwifes-bull-mastiff-dog-7896776.html"]Sicky Clicky[/url]

Edited September 4, 2012 by carlt

[mrsmelly]

[quote name='Ange' timestamp='1346758087' post='933546']
I thought that was Nottingham - or it the gun capital?
[/quote]