A GRANDMOTHER assaulted and knocked to the ground in her own yard, attempts to kill pets by feeding them poison, needles and broken glass, youths threatening to bash elderly and disabled residents and children turning power off to a house where a resident depends on a machine to help him breathe.
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What sounds like scenes from a nightmare are very real for O'Donnell Street residents who are fed up with being on the receiving end of vandalism attacks, assaults, verbal abuse, break-ins and arson attempts.
More than a dozen O'Donnell Street residents met with the Daily Liberal to tell of their families' experiences living in what many of them believe is not just the worst street in Dubbo, but in New South Wales.
The grandmother who had been assaulted in her own yard pointed out a nearby house that her attackers had emerged from.
"I was watering my lawn one night and a group of girls ripped my hose off me and started whacking me with it," she said.
She said the group pushed her over and left her there.
"I had to go to the hospital that night to have x-rays on my shoulder because I injured it when I got knocked to the ground," she said.
“They had to check my heart, because I have heart problems which I have to take tablets three times a day for.
“The next time I went out to water my backyard I had rocks thrown at me.”
The incident was reported to police, but the grandmother said it was the tip of the iceberg.
“The problem with this street is, when you’ve got kids three years old with no clothes on, carrying slingshots, standing in the middle of the road at night, where do you start?” she said.
The grandmother said there were probably three public housing residences in O’Donnell and surrounding streets where most of the troublemakers lived.
She said she believed one of those houses recently became vacant.
The grandmother and other residents said their comments were by no means a generalisation about all public housing tenants, because several lived in Housing NSW properties themselves.
She said Housing NSW representatives came to ask her about problems in the street, and the constant loud swearing from one residence, day and night, was just one of the things she had to tell them about.
She said she and three other residents had approached the department to erect fencing to protect them from unruly neighbours, but that had not eventuated.
“A lady near here died of a heart attack the other day and I’m sure it’s because of all the stress with the teenagers and the problems in this street,” she said.
Another resident known to the grandmother said she was frequently abused when she went to check on the older woman, who was continually harassed by out-of-control children.
“I pulled up in her driveway after her back neighbours had been throwing dirty nappies into her yard and shouting out things at her, ” she said.
“A little boy and two girls were sitting on the road at the corner and they were yelling at me, ‘Get off the road you white ****’,” she said.
“I said to them, ‘Why don’t you get off the road? This is a road, not a path’. Not that I should have to justify to some kid my right to drive along the road.
“And she’s a grandmother who’s lived in this street for years and now she feels like she can’t even stand in her own yard.”
She said there were 15 children in the grandmother’s driveway when she pulled in to check on her one night recently.
“They were yelling abuse at us and started throwing rocks.
One hit my car and one hit my hand,” she said.
“I took an envelope out and started to write a detailed description of what one of them was wearing, the colour of his backpack and his hair. He asked me what I was doing and I told him I was writing down his description to take to the police station.
“He would have been about 12, and there he was lunging towards me saying, ‘I’m going to flog you and bash you and I’ll get you and kick the **** out of you.’ For him to come at me like that is not right.”
She said a relative of hers was also frequently harassed by two girls who waited for her to get off the bus when she got home from school.
“They walk around like they own the place and sometimes bail her up. No wonder she is terrified of getting the bus,” she said.
The woman said those who were in a position to change things needed to listen to what the victims had to say.
“To the magistrates - don’t keep letting these kids off because then they have nothing to be scared about and will keep doing it.
“To the government I say cut off the parents’ welfare payments so they are actually forced to stop and think, ‘Hang on a minute, maybe we need to get our act together.’”
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