A woman has been fined more than £1,000 for failing to pick up piles of dog poo from her own back garden, after neighbours complained about the smell. Alison Dawson, 48, ignored numerous notices from Durham County Council to clean up the dirty mess before she was brought to court.
Alison was served an abatement notice after residents first made their complaints about the piles of poo being an "eyesore". The council ordered her to clean up the faeces at her home in Stanley, County Durham, but she failed to do so. She was fined a total of £1,038 for ignoring the warnings and slapped with a Community Protection Notice (CPN).
A council spokesperson said: "A female from South Moor has been prosecuted for failing to comply with a Community Protection Notice (CPN) which required her to remove waste and dog faeces from her yard.
"Alison Dawson of Mitchell Street, South Moor ignored notices to remove waste from the yard of her property and now has to pay a total of £1038 in fines and costs and she has now been left with a criminal record."
Pictures posted onto the Durham County Council Wardens Facebook page show excrement, rubbish and an old fridge, dumped in Dawson's back garden.
And some locals claim there is still dog poo left in the garden even after the court action.
One resident said: "It's like living near an open sewer. What sort of person leaves dog poo everywhere? In the summer the whole street stinks.
"She shouldn't have got a fine, she should've been forced to buy a scoop and a roll of bin bags."
Dawson explained that she did not clean up the garden because it was "the last thing on my mind" after losing a close friend.
She said: "I had just lost my best friend. The garden was the last thing on my mind. The last thing I was thinking about was cleaning my yard. It is my yard, and they are my dogs.
"Those photos [taken by the council] were taken about three years ago.
"I did receive two council notices, but I found out about the fine via Facebook and then when I came back home from my daughter’s house, and I found a letter through my door.
"It was plastered all over Facebook before I knew. It's sent my anxiety through the roof.
"What are people going to think of me when I walk down the street? I'm a mess, my anxiety is so high right now."
Do you have a dog story to share? Email nia.dalton@reachplc.com.
