Fed-Up Neighbours of ‘Mr Mayhem’ Peter Brady write to MP for help

As reported here last week, the notorious neighbour from hell is facing fresh charges after it was alleged he was caught pouring bleach over his neighbour’s flowers.

It comes only a couple of months after he was convicted of harassing and flashing his genitals at fed-up neighbours in Bridge Street, Lurgan.

Last week, a judge banned him from living there until his current charges of criminal damage and breaching a restraining order – which had been issued to protect his put-upon neighbours – are dealt with.

Last Saturday, at a special sitting of Lisburn Magistrates Court it was claimed that the 49-year-old has made “full admissions” to the police over the alleged offence involving his neighbour’s flowers.

After the judge in the case granted Brady bail only on the basis he lived somewhere else until the case is next heard, neighbours in Bridge Street breathed a sigh of relief.

But residents remain concerned about his potential return and have written letters to DUP MP Carla Lockhart about the ongoing issue.

One neighbour told the Sunday World this week: “It’s great that he’s gone for a while but there’s no guarantee he won’t be back and we need to know that he won’t.

“People have suffered long enough here. This is a really nice place to live and everyone else gets on really well but Mr Brady has been a constant thorn in our sides.

“Residents have been left suffering anxiety and depression as a result of his behaviour which is just completely crazy.

“So we have written to Carla Lockhart. She’s our MP and she has come back and said she would look into the case for us.

“At the end of the day everyone just wants to live here in peace without the fear of being abused by this man.”

It’s understood around 20 residents living in Bridge Street signed the letter which was sent to the DUP MP for Upper Bann.

Letters have also been written to the housing association which is currently in the process of trying to relocate Mr Brady out of the area.

And a letter was posted on the door of a local church which neighbours say had been offering support to Peter Brady.

Part of that letter states: “As I indicated in my previous correspondence, I do not expect you to make Peter Brady an outcast, the church should be for everyone, but I do expect you to point out to him the error of his ways and encourage him to be a better more loving person and to actually practise the religion to which he claims to belong.

“He has terrorised his neighbours for years, he has called the police on them multiple times with false charges, he has called women who visit anyone on the street terrible, misogynistic names and makes sexual comments about them.

“The residents of the street are suffering with anxiety and depression over this and they have reached out to you for help.”

Last week Brady was charged with three offences – one of breaching a restraining order and two of damaging plants and flowers on July 23.

A prosecuting lawyer said the concern of the PPS and police was that if Brady entered a guilty plea, “he can go back to the address and there’s nothing to stop a reoccurrence”.

He revealed that Brady has previous convictions relating to the same victim including harassment and exposing his genitals.

While the PPS lawyer suggested that it could be a case that “as with most neighbour disputes, no one comes with clean hands,” DJ Watters told him, “that’s not true, sometimes there are just neighbours from hell”.

Brady’s solicitor told the court his client doesn’t want to live in Bridge Street any longer where his flat has been adapted to cope with his mobility issues but “he doesn’t have enough points to get away.”

The notorious nuisance has plagued his neighbours for years with a string of outlandish outbursts and false complaints to the police.

Cops became so fed up with Brady wasting their time they decided to prosecute him, deeming his fake claims of criminality as harassment.

Brady was finally convicted in court in May of two counts of harassment on two neighbours.

He was also found guilty of exposing his genitals to a horrified female neighbour who he had also been harassing.

steven.moore@sundayworld.com