Teens Smoking Weed Near Our House

[Verbena37]

Not sure if this goes in WWYD but hope I’ve got the right place.

So our house and garden backs onto the town playpark. On the far side, is a skatepark, border by garages where youths hang out and do whatever it is youths do (racing cars without lights late at night/smoking weed/playing loud music/drinking etc).

However, for the past few weeks, a few gangs of youths have been hanging out on the pocket park benches right behind our house and our elderly neighbour’s house and being unsociable into the early hours (last night it was from around 12:30-4am!

A few weeks back, when it was really hot and my bedroom windows were open, the smell of cannabis being smoked by them, actually came into our bedroom. Then last night, they were smoking some really strong cannabis, again coming through our bedroom windows and making me actually feel quick sick. Last night, they were shouting, laughing, playing loud music literally 100 yards from our garden.

We live in a nice town where you don’t really see any police other than 1 ‘special’ or whatever they’re now called and to be honest, he isn’t pretty useless.

WWYD? I don’t care if they wanna smoke weed etc but until 4am on a regular basis and when it’s coming in through the windows, I’m not so happy about!

I would call 111 and report it. If you give them the information, the police may be able to do something about it.

I couldn't comment on how useless or otherwise your local police are, but policing is meant to be intelligence-led these days. That you don't happen to see them is not an indication of how much work they are doing.

Thanks for your reply. That was meant to say he IS pretty useless.
If we call 111, we end up feeling like the criminals! They seem so pissed off we are bothering to report something it makes me not want to.
Anyway, I’ve found an email for informing the county police about low level stuff so i’ll perhaps use that.

Tell the police every time. It's a banned drug, they shouldn't be doing it and the police should be enforcing it. They might start patrolling just to stop you complaining!

Ok cool.
DH is worried they’ll say something like ‘we’ve had complaints from that house’, identifying us and we will get dmage to our house and car again.

This is an older thread but something similar recently happened to me and my eventual reaction might be useful to others suffering the same. The short version is: call the police, it seemed to work for me. Longer version:

My house backs onto a small churchyard park and a couple of weeks ago I noticed a group of 6 teens had adopted a stand of trees just outside my garden well as a meeting place for 1-2 hours most weekdays, 5-7pm. It seemed like they'd come from a job or school. Their noise was annoying and my attic studio skylight overlooks them so I didn't feel able to lean out and enjoy the cooler air when they were there. But hardly anything I could do, right? They'd leave some rubbish, which I find hateful but not a police matter.

However, a few days ago the smell of weed started coming into the house from them (the trees are maybe 20 feet from my wall, 50 from my skylight) and I phoned the police, not expecting much given their common indifference to weed use, but the woman on the phone was sympathetic and took my details, saying she'd see if anyone was in the area. I continued to peer out of the cracked skylight like a cliche, without much hope.

For context, the dense treeline means I can't see to the edge of the park or much beyond where the teens are. But I see one teen notice something in the direction of the churchyard road, and they ALL start hurriedly packing up and stuffing things into their bags, almost like pantomime hurrying. They were spooked! Normally when they move off, it takes a minute or so, with hugs and goodbyes and leaving in different directions. This time, gone in ten seconds, keeping as far away from the source of alarm as possible. I can't come to any conclusion except an officer or car was seen coming in and they panicked. What I don't know is if they were contacted and the officer did a search or admonished them, or if the officer(s) felt a non-confrontational scare was enough. But it's a good start, and I'm hopeful they won't come back.

Does this make me seem like every middle-class mid-thirties killjoy? Damn right it does.

I don't mind the smell of weed but would object to people within earshot of my house making noise. That is antisocial behaviour and should be reported.