We’ve been full time RVing for 6 years
now without neighbor issues other than minor annoyances. We recently had an experience with a neighbor
that had us moving out quickly in the night and making a new life rule! Trails End R.V. Park which had been a nice
park in the past was changing its philosophy towards filling the park with full
time residents and as such was letting some very impoverished and questionable
people into the park. Unfortunately, we
were in a lot with empty lots around us.
We had two different trailers and renters move into the lot behind ours
only to get tossed out. One was asked to
leave for lack of funds to pay his rent and the other for issues with his
dogs. Our craziest neighbor moved in
next to us. We knew he was not right in
his head and had a scary edge the first day he arrived. We should have left when our rent first came
due, if not sooner. We’ve added moving
out when scary crazies move in to our list of life rules! From day one we started altering our actions,
because of his presence. Roy tried to be especially nice thinking it
would ward off trouble with him. We
locked our door more. Our thoughts were on our safety, but we hadn’t
considered potential damage to property. The guy started out staying to himself
and then slowly started coming out and about terrorizing his neighbors. He mostly was just abusive in his comments,
but did let some know he had a large knife hidden up inside a walking stick and
that he had a gun, as well. He angrily
grumbled about what should have been positive short exchanges. He wanted favors and was angered whether
things went his way or not. I took him
to have a very controlling and abusive personality. Thursday night, November 12th, it
sounded like he was punching the inside of his trailer walls and he roamed around
outside swearing so loudly to himself that we could hear him over a movie we
were watching! I think that was the day
he was told he had a week to leave, because of the number of complaints the
office was getting about him. Although several
people had complained about him, it seemed he decided to particularly blame us! We think this came about, as Roy had tried to
befriend him only to have it create negative feelings later on. The Friday after the neighbor’s evening rant,
Roy found a suspicious cut about the width of a knife blade in the side of our
front tire. Roy suspected the crazy
neighbor, but it could have been one of the crazies from behind us that minor
tensions had occurred with. We probably
should have left the park that day based on our suspicions, but didn’t. On
Friday our crazy neighbor made a particularly nasty remark to a guy’s
wife. He had made abusive remarks to
other women living near him, also. The
park manager told our neighbor he would have to leave on Saturday! The evening of Friday the 13th the
neighbor got on another drunken rage. We
could hear the bashing of the inside of the trailer and his outdoor rants. The park management called the marshal’s
office and four vehicles showed up! The
show of force told me they knew of him!
They told him to stay in his trailer until morning, which of course, he
didn’t do. People were told to call 911
if he was seen outside the trailer.
After the police left, we saw him leaning against our truck and talking
to some new neighbors that had moved in behind us for the week. He was telling them how people think he is
crazy, but he isn’t! Roy called 911 and
the marshals came out again. They didn’t
do anything besides try to get him to stay in his trailer. He came out with them still there and they
didn’t do anything. We decided to pack
up and leave, as the neighbor was escalating in his defiant behavior towards
the park residents and we were becoming fearful that he might decide to start
shooting people or at a minimum cause damage to our vehicle. We had the police stay while we loaded
up. Amazing how quickly one can get on
the road! We went over by the casino for
some free overnight camping. It was the
best sleep we’d had in a month! After we
left the park, the crazy neighbor was reported to have begun pretend shooting
people with his finger and making threatening remarks! That was one more escalation before possibly
doing the real thing in my opinion. The marshals
returned and took him away for the night.
Roy checked the truck Saturday morning to find that the plastic rain
shield over the driver’s door had been busted, and that there was a suspicious
mark in the windshield and paint. We
checked out some r.v. parks just outside Cottonwood. We were lucky to get into Rio Verde RV Park
on 89A towards Sedona. We told them the
crazy guys name and gave them Trails End RVs number for verification. The gal in the office looked him up on the
Yavapai Superior Court website and found that he has a whole list of charges
against him going back as far as 2003!
Some burglary, but most returning to properties he was thrown off of by
the police or owner. We were told by a
Trails End Park resident that the crazy guy said he had been thrown out of
every park he’d been in! I counted about
a dozen such charges! I was glad to see
there weren’t any violence charges other than a single assault of a minor. I talked to an r.v. park up the street to
give them the heads-up, but found that they had already had dealings with him
of a similar nature and that he wouldn’t be allowed back there. Whew! I
was glad to hear that! We’re very happy
with our new location, but it took awhile to recuperate from our encounter with
this guy. We’ve decided if we see him
around our new location that we will move on, but for now we are going to
follow through with our plans for this area.
Thoughts on guns: In the
heat of dealing with our scary neighbor and afterward, people would mention
that they have a gun and speak as though they wouldn’t hesitate to use it. Our philosophy is that it’s great to have a
gun in the event that your life is being threatened and there isn’t any chance
for escape, but that any use of a gun is going to incur expensive and tension
filled legal ramifications that could determine your actions to be in the wrong. I’ve always heard that you can only match
force with equal force. Someone’s
ranting and the fear you might feel isn’t enough to start flashing your gun
around and most likely will only escalate the problem. A crazy like our neighbor might shoot you
directly, but would be more likely to shoot you right through the side of your
rig or some other time when you didn’t see it coming! Best to move on as soon as a crazy moves in
or at a minimum when they ramp up like our neighbor did!
Using 911: Since the police advised the r.v. park
residents to call 911, we had to check the internet to see whether our phone
number from another state would contact 911 in the state of origin! It
turns out calling 911 will connect you with a local central dispatcher capable
of contacting local 911 dispatchers around the United States and Canada! The internet pointed out that you could be on
the phone with a friend across the country when they experience an
emergency. You could call 911 on their
behalf. You would be connected to the
911 dispatcher for the area you are in regardless of your phone area code and
you would then be transferred to the dispatcher for the area your friend is
in. Another internet example of 911
networking says that no matter where you call 911 from in New York City the call
will be routed through one of 5 centers all located in Brooklyn. Now we know!
