Neighbour - should I report anything? Am I overreacting?

[Axolottie]

Our neighbour lives alone and is in her eighties. Her husband died just over a year ago. I would say both of them have/had dementia.

We used to hear the arguing through the wall every day. Always the husband shouting at her, and her pleading for him to stop.
She spoke to me once about protecting herself from him.
He died suddenly. I’ve always kept an eye out for details if a funeral - but there hasn’t been one, and she said to me a couple of months ago that she was having a lot of problems with the coroner.

My initial thought (and perhaps irrational thought) when he suddenly died was that - perhaps she did something??
Should I say anything to anyone or just butt out?
Another concern I have is that she told my partner she has a gun. She showed it to him, and it’s only an air pistol. She said she was going to shoot foxes with it - the issue is that she thinks there are foxes under a small bush in our front garden (there aren’t!). I have 2 children and - again maybe irrational - but what if she decided to shoot at an imaginary fox when we are out the front??
Partner thinks I’m overreacting??

@Axolottie

No - he’s not in the house! I saw him being taken out in a private ambulance.

So what's the problem. If she had killed him they would know by now .

I'm shocked and appalled at the responses you've had here OP.
In my line of work, I have to deal with vulnerable children and adults and we have been trained to trust our gut. If something feels off, then it likely is.
I wouldn't try to work out the details of her story, but I would give adult social services a call to say you're worried about her. She potentially has dementia and owns a shotgun. I'd be concerned about that.

Her husband was abusing her and you haven't seen him for over a year. She says he's dead, but to your knowledge, no funeral has taken place.

Just reveal the facts, try to ignore your suspicions, but I'd put money on your gut instinct being right that something is off.

I'm currently working with a family where the father is very appeasing, very loving towards the children, very communicative with me. But something didn't sit right with me. After a bit of tim spent with his wife, it has become apparent that he is controlling her, taking away her freedoms and being abusive.

Always trust your gut.

She doesn't appear to want to inform the police, so it seems like she wants a more supportive approach for this woman than anything.

No she doesn't the woman asked for help and op didn't do anything. She wants a word with the coroner to share details if tbe arguments and put suspicion onto a very elderly lady.

She didn't ask where she could get the woman some practical support. She asked if she should raise her suspicions that she murdered her husband. As least partially based on the fact that she spoke to him a few days enforce and he was fine.

As though sudden death of elderly people is a rarity.

Her husband was abusing her and you haven't seen him for over a year. She says he's dead, but to your knowledge, no funeral has taken place.

Op saw the private ambulance taking him away.

She says he's dead, and has dementia.
My mother had dementia and said her mother was alive.

Leaving aside the OP not being interested enough to report an abused woman but now wanting to accuse that woman of murder, the most likely truth is that the husband is alive and kicking in a home, or is indeed dead, the funeral maybe was carried out under Covid restrictions with few or no mourners present.

A useful (perhaps the only useful) thing the OP should do is inform Social Services she has a vulnerable neighbour who doesn't appear to have any outside agency involvement.

If there were any suspicions of domestic abuse / something dodgy then surely the police would have been round to ask you questions by now as a neighbour who may have heard something.

I think you're being unreasonable with regards to the whole death part of it because the relevant authorities have been involved. It really is none of your business to be contacting services for that.

With regard to the air pistol, that would concern me (especially as she possibly has dementia) but I would contact adult social services and voice your concerns.

Does she have any family that visit?

He’s probably had a post-mortem, coroner isn’t always involved. If she has dementia she may have forgotten, got confused. Think you’re making yourself look a bit Miss Marple over nothing

[quote Axolottie]@HoppingPavlova

So by that reasoning I should also have ignored the potential domestic violence I heard through the walls and dismissed it as just another of my ‘crackpot theories’.[/quote]
Well you didn't do anything about it, did you?

As PP have said, if the police/ambulance were there at the time he died they will have had time to notice if the man died of a gunshot wound.

Stop stirring/seeking drama.

My dad's inquest happened 11 months after his death and this was pre pandemic. I found it very frustrating dealing with the coroner's office. They postponed the inquest twice last minute because of staff sickness, which was very hard on my mum. Then they tried to book it at a time when we were due to be on holiday (which we'd told them previously) and put a lot of pressure on us to cancel the holiday to attend - I refused. It took 11 months and it was very straightforward when it happened. No suspicion of murder at any point. Given we're now in the pandemic years I guess things must be harder to arrange now. It wouldn't surprise me that it's taken a year or more to have an inquest particularly in a relatively simple case. I think they get delayed sometimes so the more complicated ones can go through. Also it was hard enough to liaise with the coroner's office without having dementia.

Sounds like you need to stop reading the tabloids, or do you really want the police to descend on a vulnerable,.potentially domestically abused woman? Now,.social services for dementia is another issue and that would be caring if she hasn't got a plan in place, but since you don't actually seem to know her I would be presumptuous

She had UK death registrations for 2021, he died in 2020.

So it could have been registered in 2020 then.
You are relying on information from a woman you believe has dementia.
I would report the gun though.
Strange you didn't report the domestic abuse at the time.

Just because someone’s death is reported to the Coroner, it doesn’t mean the there will be an inquest. We report deaths all the time as patients who have died within so many days of a medical procedure have to be. I can only think of one inquest in 20 years.

You're massively over reacting. You saw his body leave the house via an ambulance. That shows that authorities are aware. Nothing to worry about at all.

If you think your concerns are genuine then report your suspicions over the death and gun to the police and the dementia to social services.

If there's nothing wrong then nothing will happen.

I do think you are being a bit Agatha Christie but maybe you are not so make the call if you think you should.

Jesus Christ, I hope this is a wind up.

OP ignored signs of domestic violence and an opportunity to help an elderly, vulnerable neighbour whilst her husband was still alive. And now he's dead, she wants her poor neighbour to be the subject of a murder enquiry based on the malicious spurious suspicions of an idle curtain-twitcher with too much time on her hands.

The preferred MO of one side of my family is to drop dead from undiagnosed, asymptomatic heart disease. They do it at all ages and stages, and cuts across both genders. There's enough of us (myself included) who have found a supposedly healthy relative dead in their home, having dropped with no warning.

It can be quite traumatic when a relative dies without warning, whether you are physically present/find the body or not. The last thing ANYONE in that situation needs is the local curtain-twitcher, who was about as much use as a chocolate teapot in your case when there was ACTUALLY something worth raising concerns about, poking about at the coroner's trying to imply something untoward has happened.

Do you think she murdered him? Realistically? Because that's what it feels like your trying to find out but dressing it up as faux concern. Don't email the coroner. If you have genuine concerns for her mental well-being then the only authority you should speak with is social services. Someone upthread suggested their GP, don't do that. It's massively overstepping boundaries and many people wouldn't welcome that kind of interfering from their neighbours.
You're giving this too much headspace. Maybe go on a spa day or something.

Before he died, she phoned me once in tears saying she didn’t know what to do when he got angry with her, and was concerned about her safety. I remember telling her to come round to me - or to go into the toilet and lock the door. So it was quite an intense level of arguing - and it happened several times a day. I should have reported it then.

I can't believe what I'm reading, a vulnerable elderly woman came to you when she was being abused and you did nothing - but now you want to report some fantasy you made up in your head?!

Strange thread. Weird OP and weird answers.

This doesn't come across well.

You've diagnosed them both with dementia. You don't know that.
She appealed to you about domestic violence which you had heard, and your response is basically to tell her you won't get involved.
Now you want to send a note accusing her of murder.

And let's say that she did murder him. Actually premeditated murder, not pushing him away from her because she was scared and him hitting his head.
She's not going to be a danger to other people. It's not going to bring him back. It will be far more distressing for their relatives to find that out.

But the most likely explanation is either she thinks he's dead but in a hospice, or he died naturally and the coroners report is taking ages. They sometimes do, even without a pandemic going on.

You could have a chat to the police about the air rifle, but don't "accidentally" mention to them while they're there that you think she killed her husband with no evidence.

She rang you asking for help, a vulnerable woman with dementia and you didn't think to assist her, in any way - not necessarily the police, although this was an option. Some dementia sufferers can become verbally aggressive and unkind, maybe this was her husband. Maybe there was more to it. Whatever happened, she needed help, you could have contacted their family, social services, age charities, her doctor, the police. Pop in to check on her in the meantime or get her out of the house regularly. There's a long list of things you could have done here. You did nothing.

Then you come on MN with your sofa detective theories that she killed her husband.

It's nasty, nosey and frankly disgusting. And you keep at it throughout this thread. It's just unbelievable. Less Netflix true crime for you as well, way too much time on your hands to breed your alternative reality. You're not an interested party here, you really are not.

The only thing I'd report to the police is the pistol to make sure she's not a danger to herself or anyone else unintentionally.

OMG what they said.

Leave the coroner alone.

Speak to police about gun, you have every right to be worried about that. Maybe not in normal circs. The hedge fox children scenario could happen. Probably won't. Does sound like a feasible scenario. Good luck.

[quote Axolottie]@Sunrae28 my Mum is registered with various Ancestry type websites as she does a lot of family history research. She looked it up for me, as she also thinks it’s all a bit odd, She had UK death registrations for 2021, he died in 2020.

It does feel a bit nosy, but surely if info about death registrations/coroners inquests wasn’t in the public’s interest, the info wouldn’t be made available?
I saw the ambulance/police/private ambulance when he died so I know it happened.[/quote]
Uk death indexes are only available up until 2019 online. More recent you have to contact GRO or local registry office and have the exact details to get the information. So it doesn’t mean the death isn’t registered. There was likely an initial coroner case that was opened and closed quickly without need for coroners court so you wouldn’t find details online for that either. He may have had a direct cremation hence no funeral and she’s either not wanting to tell you that or is confused about the timeline.

@PurplePansy05 I agree with you about the pistol and the general sentiment of your response.

I don't think you are over reacting. You are unsure of what you've been witnessing and you are seeking advice.
The gun makes me uncomfortable. I would report it as you do not want an air rifle in the hands of someone who may have dementia right next door to your kids.
That would be my main worry.