I will try to keep this short. We live in the bottom floor of a split level Victorian house, she lives upstairs with her two young children and her partner. The house is very badly insulated so we hear everything that goes on upstairs.
DH and I phoned the Police a few months ago because we thought that her partner was killing her. We could hear what sounded like a body being thrown about and hit. My neighbour was screaming and begging him to stop and to leave. The police came just as she was running out of the house with her children. She told them that nothing was wrong and they asked him to leave and cool off.
They all came back a few hours later and the fighting continued. I want to stress that I have never heard anyone be so violent and say such horrible things to another person. The children were crying and begging him to stop. We phoned the Police again, non emergency number this time, but they never came by.
Since then, some of our other neighbours phoned the Police on this family as well, during another violent fight. My upstairs neighbour has made it very clear to me that she was very angry that we had phoned the police, and that she thought we had were the people that had phoned them the second time.
They had another very bad fight yesterday. I started slamming some pots about, just to let them know that I could hear them. A few minutes later my upstairs neighbour knocked on my door with her youngest child. She was very upset, crying and shaking.
She asked me to tell her if I had a problem with her and to stop interfering and phoning the police and making things harder for her. I kept on asking her if she wanted to come in and if she was OK. Then she went back upstairs and they fought all afternoon.
I really am not sure how to deal with this. I feel bad for slamming the pots around instead of doing something to help her, but I am not sure how to help her! I can't sit around and do nothing. Any advice would be appreciated!
(I am about to put my DS to bed, so I might not be able to respond until he is asleep)