How 81-year-old widow ‘weaponised’ pet parrot to torture her neighbours

A spring evening and Catherine Searle emerged from her terrace house, carefully crossing the road to the small patch of grass opposite.

There she briefly stopped to scatter some breadcrumbs on the ground — an 81-year-old widow feeding the birds.

But as she turned to head back home, one hand was dragged across the bonnet of a parked car, as if to steady herself.

On another occasion, also at dusk, Searle repeated the same routine, this time momentarily stooping down as she passed the passenger wheel of the same vehicle.

Again, a fleeting moment, and one that, had it not been caught on CCTV would never have aroused any suspicion — just an elderly bird-lover going about her daily routine. 

But as neighbours Paul and Lydia Appleton have learned to their cost, Searle’s actions were anything but innocent. 

Indeed, for the past three years, the couple claim to have been terrorised by their elderly neighbour.

It started, they say, with a noise complaint and escalated from there. In 2017 Searle was caught on CCTV throwing dog mess (source unknown) into their garden.

The following year, her activities were caught by cameras at the front of the house — on 38 occasions she was filmed smearing grease over the bonnets of a van and car belonging to the couple.

In addition, she scratched the bonnet of their Toyota with her ring and placed sharp tacks under the wheels of one of the vehicles.

But in many ways it was the psychological warfare that she waged against the couple that caused the most upset.

Because not only did she ‘weaponise’ her ornithological activities outside the house — but inside it, too.

Living with the widow was an African grey parrot called Ringo.

The species is highly intelligent and notorious for its ability to mimic noises heard in its environment, and the Appletons claim the bird’s singalongs — everything from advertising riffs to operatic arias — were the equivalent of ‘Chinese torture’.

With windows open and music blaring, Ringo would let rip. Such was the volume, any attempt by the couple to sit in their garden ended with them being driven back inside.

‘The parrot was just calling tunes, wolf whistles, McDonald’s adverts, over and over, it was just ridiculous,’ said Mrs Appleton. ‘It has a whole repertoire.’

Unable to cope any more, they reluctantly involved the police.

At the end of last month, the case came to court where Searle was handed a restraining order and 70-day jail term suspended for 12 months.

Whether that will be the end of it, only time will tell.

Because the signs are that harmony has yet to break out in the quiet cul-de-sac of the Kent village where the warring parties live.

With Searle currently in hospital having recently suffered a bad fall down her stairs, family and neighbours rallied to her defence.

They claim it is unfair to brand her ‘Britain’s oldest neighbour from hell’ — saying that the Appletons are simply overly sensitive and that the parrot isn’t a problem.

‘Ringo’s as good as gold,’ said one neighbour. 

‘I’ve only heard it in the summer time when the back door is open but other than that, you don’t hear him. He’s not noisy — he just copies little noises he hears.’

However, the Appletons, who married in 2017, say that such comments typify their struggle to get anyone to believe them.

When people learn their tormentor is an 81-year-old pensioner they dismiss it as a ‘joke’.

‘The problem we have got, because she’s an old lady, people want to believe the lies,’ said Mr Appleton. ‘I try to be nice, but she doesn’t deserve any kind of respect.’

The small terrace of housing located on the outskirts of a small village on the edge of Sevenoaks provides an unlikely backdrop for such a bitter neighbourly dispute.

Many residents have lived there for years. Searle herself moved in with her husband John, who died three years ago, in 1977.

The houses have large gardens at the back, beyond which lies rolling farmland. But it’s at the front where the first indications that all is not well are to be found.

To the side of Searle’s door are two signs. One reads: ‘Good wine, good friends, good times.’ A more recent addition, states: ‘These premises are under CCTV surveillance.’

And a glance towards the roofline shows it is not the only one.

Next door are the Appletons’ cameras, on which damning evidence of Searle’s behaviour would be captured.

Although the incidents were more frequent in recent years, Mrs Appleton says problems began soon after she moved in.

‘She [Searle] claims it’s over parking but it goes way, way back,’ says Mrs Appleton, a 61-year-old former counsellor. 

‘It started in 2004 when I asked her nicely if she could turn the noise down of a TV that was in the garden blaring away. She seems to have taken an instant dislike.’

After Mr Appleton, also 61, a retired police officer, subsequently moved in, things got worse.

‘I am a former detective inspector with 30 years of service,’ he said. ‘My last job was protecting victims of domestic violence, hate crime and child abuse. It’s absolutely not in my DNA to be someone who causes problems for someone else. My whole approach to this lady has always been “can we sort this out? Can we end this animosity?” ’

Matters came to a head three years ago when Searle was caught on camera throwing dog’s mess into the Appletons’ garden. 

CCTV footage from the time shows her walking at the rear of their property before casually emptying the contents of a black plastic bag on to the ground.

She admitted what she had done and was given a community order.

Then, in 2018, she began to target the couple’s Ford Transit van and Toyota car.

They noticed that their vehicles had been tampered with — claiming to have found their tyres let down and glass and tacks placed under the wheels.

When they checked their CCTV cameras they spotted that their neighbour had been acting suspiciously.

At the same time, their lives were being made a living hell by the continuous noise directed at them.

This involved loud music and noise from the TV — all with the added accompaniment of Ringo the singing parrot.

‘All through last year, this parrot has been used every time we’ve gone in the garden,’ said Mr Appleton. ‘We never really see it but just hear it.’

His wife says Searle’s tactic was to egg on the parrot to break into ear-splitting performances.

‘She’s continuously finding ways to over-stimulate her parrot for days on end by playing the television loudly and is using it as a weapon,’ said Mrs Appleton.

‘This constant noise from her parrot is akin to Chinese torture. There is no escaping the piercing noises it makes in a continuous repertoire over and over.

‘Searle goes to another room and plays loud music or puts on her TV to keep the bird stimulated all day. She even leaves her house, going out, leaving the back door and windows open so the bird noise can be heard wherever we are in our house.

‘In addition to this, she waits for us to go into the back garden when we want to relax and then will put on loud music or the TV to get the bird to ‘perform’ again, thereby stopping us from enjoying the peace and quiet of the garden.’

If Ringo wasn’t making noise, the TV would take over. 

‘On one occasion, we had Toy Story being played in her kitchen on a continuous loop,’ says Mr Appleton.

‘It was being played really, really loud. She was over in her other neighbour’s garden having a drink and laughing. It was just noise. I’m guessing it was about seven hours of continuous Toy Story.’

Despite this, he said that they never wanted to see the matter end up in court.

‘We went to the police because we were at our wits’ end and we really couldn’t take any more,’ said Mr Appleton. 

‘The police asked us to prosecute and we said we don’t want to be the bad guys here. Don’t prosecute, give her a caution, give her a telling off and hopefully that will stop things but it didn’t.’

And so it was Mrs Searle was charged with harassment and criminal damage. She initially denied the claims, but pleaded guilty half way through a trial last December at Maidstone Magistrates’ Court.

The case returned there for sentencing on February 20 when she was handed a restraining order and 70-day jail term suspended for 12 months.

It was found that Searle, who lives off a £114 weekly pension, had caused £330 worth of damage to their cars, and was ordered to pay £779.77 in court costs and compensation.

In a victim impact statement, Mrs Appleton said: ‘I feel nervous for my husband when he’s on the road. I’m in fear of what might happen. He could be hurt or cause a terrible accident.

He has to go through a daily routine of checking the wheels to make sure there are no tacks and nothing has been tampered with.’ 

She added that she has suffered night terrors as a result of her concerns. 

Probation officer Lauren Packham, who interviewed the pensioner, said: ‘I’ve spoken to Mrs Searle and it’s clear she doesn’t fully accept culpability.

‘She says the grease on the vehicle was the result of her falling, but she only made reference to one occasion, not multiple. She believes she is as much a victim in this neighbourly dispute.’

And she is not alone, which the Appletons are painfully aware of.

‘We have neighbours who shun us because of this,’ said Mrs Appleton. ‘For a number of years my husband and I have been subject to what we can only describe as a hate campaign and hostility from several of the neighbours.

‘They have never come to us and asked our version of events. Rather, they chose to believe what was being said about us in a malicious and untruthful way.’

Her husband added: ‘We know that around here now we are Marmite. The people who listen to the lies and not wanting to hear our side of the story hate us and we get open animosity. We are absolutely not the cause of this problem.’

But one neighbour, who asked not to be named, said that it was Searle who had been ‘provoked’.

‘They’ve complained about this, they’ve complained about that, it’s been non-stop,’ the neighbour claimed.

‘This has been going on for years. One time we heard the smoke alarm going so we rang her and she said she couldn’t reach it to turn it off — but instead of knocking on the door to see if she was in trouble, they were more concerned about the noise.’

Days after being sentenced, Searle was rushed to hospital after falling down her stairs in the middle of the night.

She is understood still to be receiving treatment having suffered a dislocated finger, a fractured neck and four broken ribs.

In her absence, Searle’s son Darren, who is popping in and feeding the parrot, spoke out in her defence, saying she had been through ‘hell’ because of the ‘vendetta’ the neighbours had against his mum.

‘At the court case, my mum was absolutely terrified and she couldn’t go through with it so she pleaded guilty,’ he said.

‘She’d had enough. It’s soul-destroying knowing she’s not strong enough to defend herself in court because, if she was, I think she’d have been found innocent.

‘It’s absolutely ridiculous it’s even come to this. All she was doing was touching the vehicle while stepping off the kerb as a support because she’s a bit unsteady on her feet.’

What about Ringo?

‘I don’t understand how a parrot can be used as a weapon,’ he added. 

‘It makes a noise and they can hear it in the summer when the window is open and they’re in the garden.

‘She’s had a parrot for 40-odd years. The first one — which was an absolute nightmare — died and she’s had this one for ten to 15 years now.

‘It makes a noise of a telephone occasionally but it’s not that loud — it doesn’t squawk.’

The Appletons are hoping that, going forward, it won’t sing either. 

As Mrs Appleton says: ‘All we want, and this is our ultimate aim, is to enjoy a bit of peace and quiet.’

Without being disturbed by man, woman, beast — or bird.