Hi there,
Today I will tell you how the neighbors across the street, whom we didn’t even know, came one day to insult us.
On July 7, 2024, we were in front of our house touching up the paint on the facade and applying waterproofing.
I was at one end and Diego at the other.
I started to hear someone talking very loudly and I thought it was one of the neighbors who always comes to talk when we are in front of the house doing some work.
Since it wasn’t someone talking loudly, but someone yelling, I turn around and see a woman yelling at Diego while her husband was behind her.
I went over to see what was going on and this woman said that we had thrown trash and garbage at the door of her house.
We turned around to see and the garbage she was referring to were dry leaves that had been blown by the wind and were not on her front door, but on the street in front of the garage door.
Since I have an air blower, surely this woman thought that somehow what blows away with the blower from my sidewalk, ends up in front of her garage door.
We tried to explain, and the woman kept screaming like a hysterical madwoman.
It was curious because her lips and arms were trembling. It was unbelievable how from something so stupid, the woman had such an attack.
As she spent 20 minutes screaming and didn’t seem to want to leave, at one point I started screaming louder than her to tell her to get out and she did.
The funniest thing is that she told us that we had to go and clean up the dry leaves that were in the street in front of her garage door, because otherwise she was going to pick it up and throw it on the door of our house.
I stood by all the rest of the afternoon with my cell phone in my hand to record her when she did it, but she didn’t do it.
Just think, in my area, some of us neighbors are used to cleaning the sidewalk once a week, and that this crazy woman has never, since I’ve lived there for almost 2 years, gone out to clean or do anything. So, it doesn’t make much sense for her to come in such terms to complain about the dry leaves she imagined we left in front of the gate of her house.
In fact, we didn’t know who those two people were until that day, and we knew they were from the house across the street because we saw them going in there when they left.
Diego at first thought the woman had an emergency and was calling for help because her lip was trembling, and she was red as a tomato.
I also took pictures of the outside of the house so the police could see what the supposed trash was this lady was talking about and that it was actually a few dry leaves.
Since we had the security camera photos, I asked my lawyer what I could do since I wanted to prevent these people from doing the same thing in the future. She told me to file a libel complaint.
A few days later I filed the complaint with the PSP.
In addition, I reported them for tax fraud and because they have an illegal mechanic shop in their garage.
The mistake was that I did not call the police immediately, but the situation caught us unawares.
I also tell you one thing, at another time that silly situation would have generated stress and anxiety that would have lasted me for months, but as we have already had so many misfortunes since we arrived in Porto, it’s like I have become a little stronger psychologically.
So, I took it in a sporting way, I filed a report and simply stayed alert in case that crazy woman approached us again, to be able to record her and call the police immediately.
I filed the complaint at the PSP and then went to the Public Prosecutor’s Office (DIAP) to pay the fee and was told that I had to be represented by a lawyer; otherwise, the process would be archived.
I contacted my lawyer who proceeded to make the payment of the fee and communicated that she was my lawyer for that process.
From then on, the neighbours who had come to insult us began to denounce my security camera because it was supposedly recording the public road.
On August 28, 2 policemen from the PSP came to my house because someone had denounced my security camera. They told me that since I was not obliged to show the images, I could remove the camera and that’s it.
As I did not want to remove the camera because it is a protective measure for my house, I showed them that the camera only recorded the space in front of my gate and that it did not record the public road.
The policeman seemed frankly indignant for having to come to my house for such stupidity, especially when people should be grateful that there are cameras and the more cameras, the better.
On November 11, the same two policemen came to my house again because the same person had again reported the camera and had written the report in a different way saying that the camera was moving and taking images from inside their house.
We showed again what the camera records and made it clear that it is physically impossible for the camera to record inside anyone’s house.
From the contents of the complaint we learned that it was the two neighbours who had come to insult us who had now embarked on a campaign of harassment so that the police would be at our door from time to time.
In addition, we learned from other sources that one of the couple’s sons was in jail for stealing from Worten. To give you an idea of the kind of people we are talking about.
The policeman told me that I could report them for harassment.
The policeman also informed me that since it was the second time we had shown that the camera did not record the public road, if they sent another email in the future they would be ignored.
I then proceeded to contact my lawyer since this situation was an aggravating factor for them in my complaint for slander.