Neighbour From Hell Sentence Reduced

Gertrude Evans, the 82 year old Abergavenny woman who for a decade made her neighbour's' lives hell through repeated harassment, has had her six-month prison sentence cut to four months by the Court of Appeal.
 
Ms Evans repeatedly ignored attempts by the Court to control her behaviour and also breached the terms of her ASBO on numerous occasions. She was convicted in February 2007 of six counts of breaching her ASBO and one of harassment. When bailed pending sentence, she failed to attend her appointment with her probation officer, which was a condition of her bail. She also repeatedly refused to acknowledge the inappropriateness of her behaviour and the effect it had on her neighbours.
 
The Court felt a six-month sentence was the minimum it could impose, but the Court of Appeal, in view of her age and physical infirmities, considered that the sentence should be reduced, telling her barrister to make sure she was told 'in words of one syllable' that she should ' be under no illusions that the courts are perfectly prepared to pass a prison sentence if there are further serious breaches' of her ASBO.