Neighbour screamed "call the police" and I did nothing

[cobrapose]

I'm staying with my mum for a few days and my mum's neighbours son came home screaming, shouting and name calling his mother. I heard things being thrown and then she shouted "call the police". I was calling 999 then my mother asked me to stop. She told me not to get involved. I've just argued with her about ignoring this situation as her neighbour could end up dead one day.

I want to send a note in her letter box to tell her to call womens aid because her son is abusive.

I feel so awful for doing nothing.

They've stopped arguing now, but I feel like I should still do something to help.

I'm actually in shock. My neigbours don't do this.

Why are you saying maybe another neighbour called the police? You said yourself you called the police. I don't believe you did though.

You say you called the police
But then you say it was your neighbour

Next time OP, just do the right thing.

your post about a lack of action is not true. This sort of domestic abuse is taken very seriously. I cannot believe the amount of people on here advocating doing nothing when someone is calling for help
As I say, I know victims of serious violence, domestic and others.
I support the police but as far as I’m concerned they don’t enough funding or numbers to do their job properly and when they do, the court is often a real letdown.

@Borderstotheleftofme

Well they're there now aren't they? They can remove him from the house after his violent outburst. They can check the woman is ok, not injured and doesn't need an ambulance There are many things the Police can do once they actually arrive Without giving too much information away, I know victims of serious violence, not just domestic, it is unlikely imo that much will come of this.

The abused mum will probably defend the son, even if the police press charges and it goes to court, if the mum refuses to give evidence they may not pursue the case and everything will go back to how it was before.

If the son does twig it was OP and start harassing OPs mum their only option will be move.
The police are unlikely to be able to ‘fix’ it.

Yes and boiled eggs are probably runny.

When you hear a woman screaming "Call the police" and hear the sound of things being thrown, you bloody well call them.

You don't sit down and weigh up what the police will probably do, what the victim will probably do and what the courts will probably do.

Just be a decent person and respond when someone needs urgent assistance.

Call the police OP. The neighbor could be in serious danger if it's left to happen again. Most domestic violence goes unreported until it takes a life. Please don't turn a blind eye

I'm actually in shock. My neigbours don't do this

Not all neighbours are the same

I feel shit for not acting sooner. The neighbour is always nice and chatty to me when I see her.

And this is a reason why when women are being attacked to scream fire rather than police

I wanted to yell out the window or go out. DH stopped me he said, they'll know where we live.

Your dh watched a 15 year old girl get beaten up outside your house and you both did nothing? That's disgusting.

I'm so glad when I was 12 and an steaming drunk 18 year old decoded to jump me, sit on top of me and smash her glass bottle next to my head, that an older wan had the balls to come out and shout at her and she ran off.

@Borderstotheleftofme I also know and work with perpetrators and victims of DV. Maybe there is some geographical disparity, but it is a Policing priority here and the Courts deal with it accordingly. Where they fall down is the failure to be really tough on things like Restraining Order breaches.

@Illuyanka

Why are you saying maybe another neighbour called the police? You said yourself you called the police. I don't believe you did though.

The OP means someone probably called them when the woman actually needed urgent assistance not when the OP finally stopped faffing around, arguing with her mum, logging into Mumsnet, thinking up a nickname, name changing and then typing out a fairly large opening post.

Sorry I've read the thread now, some of the messages aimed at you are very unreasonable. I know lots of people would hesitate in that situation, people don't want to be seen as interfering

@cobrapose

I called the police. Why are people here so nasty?

Your whole post is about how you didn't call the police, unless you called them and they arrived within the 10 minutes between your posts.

Is the son an adult or teenager?

I hope the mum gets the help she needs.

So a friend of mine was stabbed by her delusional husband. The neighbours heard it and called the police. The knife missed hear heart by millimetres and she had a punctured lung but she survived. I think she is probably pleased the neighbours acted.

But people talking about courts etc are completely missing the point.

The woman needed urgent assistance right there and then.

The courts/restraining orders/whether or not the mum would go through with pressing charges are all by the by.

FFS when it went quiet, the woman could've been lying there unconscious.

@Iminaglasscaseofemotion I agree with you 100% and some of these posts make me despair. How do you live with yourself when you consciously opt to do NOTHING?

So you were asked to call the police and your mother ask you not to get involved? Jesus, I feel utter contempt for your mother, what kind of stupid coward she is? Each to their own when someone is attacked? What a selfish conscienceless piece of work she is.

Having said that, if I know that half of the people complaining in this thread would have turned a blind eye to it as well. I have been in a situation where I asked passers by to call the police after I saw a guy about to jump from a bridge. I asked 8 people, to call, every single one of them told me “they didn’t want to get involved” (hence the feeling in my post).

You have a conscience, and possibly a pair your mother is lacking, call the police (or tell your selfish mum her house will loose value if someone is killed next doors, that may get her to act, if there is a next time!)

Worra you are totally right, but I think the reason those topics have been raised is due to the amount of people saying that ultimately, it would have been a waste of time due to subsequent inaction.

The son is about 30. A few years older than me. I knew him growing up, but I no longer talk to him.

[quote BananaPop2020]@Iminaglasscaseofemotion I agree with you 100% and some of these posts make me despair. How do you live with yourself when you consciously opt to do NOTHING?[/quote]
They'll be the same people no doubt posting #Bekind all over the internet and telling women in violent relationships that there's help out there for them

A woman was murdered near us a couple of months ago, her daughter ran out into the street shouting “help, get the police”. If I heard someone in the middle of a domestic incident shout “call the police” my first thought would not be to debate whether I should indeed call the police and then post on mumsnet about it before actually picking the phone up. Someone did call the police right away in the incident I mention and went into the house to fight him off but the poor woman still died.

Someone shouts for help bloody get help!!

You didn’t call the police OP, don’t pretend you did. It’s hard to believe your post is real given your constant change of mind.

It is all very well to call the police but if they don't actually do anything other than make the son sit on the curb outside the house they are not achieving much.

Some of you posting really are arseholes.
Well done OP you did the right thing.

Often in cases like this the mother will deny her son has done anything wrong and refuse to press charges, if the police do arrive! This may easily have happened before, which the OP’s mum is aware of. If this was the case you can’t really blame the OP’s mum for not wanting to get involved, as her life could be made very uncomfortable if the son thought she had reported it.