Woman reveals horror bust-up with benefits dad of nine who terrorised her on Nightmare Neighbour Next Door
The family didn't care who they upset
A WOMAN has revealed the torment she suffered at the hands of one of the UK's most notorious families when they moved in next door.
Karen Wood, 48, is a mum of four from London who moved to her house in Teynham, Kent in 2011.
Karen lived in peace and tranquillity for two years and got on with all her neighbours. However, this all changed when benefits couple Cheryl and Rob Prudham and their nine children arrived, who were famous scroungers - raking in £40,000 in handouts every year.
Karen revealed on Nightmare Neighbour Next Door: “When I first saw Cheryl, she was on her own. As far as I was aware she just had the two children she was moving in with.
“The next thing I know, he (husband Rob) turned up with all their stuff and another six children.”
Soon after moving in, the Prudhams were pushing the council for a bigger home for their large family - and they were already receiving around £40,000 in benefits per year.
RELATED STORIES
Wanting to be neighbourly, Karen welcomed Rob to the street the next day but received little more than an unfriendly grunt.
Karen felt like the family might want their privacy and "left them to it", but the noise and chaos they brought to her neighbourhood soon started to affect her life.
She explained: “You’ve got children stomping up and down stairs with no carpet, screaming out the window to each other.”
But it wasn’t the noise that Karen had the most problem with - it was Rob's revolting spitting habit.
She said: “He would hoik up all this awful phlegm up and he didn’t care where he was - he would just spit it out. It would be on the green with children out there playing.
“He would do it at the end of my garden, on my path - I’d be out there and he’d do it in front of me and we wouldn’t care less.”
Rob also treated himself to a quad bike, which he took to extremes being as noisy as possible.
She fumed: “He tore up the road and encouraged his kids to do the same - he just didn’t care what he did to upset people.”
Rob’s behaviour was grinding Karen down. She said: “I got so upset and miserable. I’d had enough of it - I didn’t think it was fair.”
Karen summoned up the courage to speak to Rob about the quad bike.
He shouted back: “I can do whatever I want. I live here. There is nothing you can do about it.”
Karen felt that there was only one way to stop Rob’s bad behaviour, so rang the council and complained about the family.
Cheryl knocked on Karen's door and asked if she made the complaint, which she admitted.
Rob then marched up shouting and swearing at his neighbour.
Karen tried to put the incident behind her, but Rob wouldn’t let the feud die down.
She recalled: “I was out here one evening enjoying the sunshine and the kids were outside playing. Rob came out and was eating a Pot Noodle and he started jabbing his plastic fork at us."
He told them: “Report me to the council. All they’ll do to us is move us to a bigger house which is what we want - you’re just doing me a favour.”
Rob’s aggressive behaviour was making Karen feel vulnerable. She said: “They just want to make my life a living hell.”
Rob then put a gate up, preventing Karen from wheeling her bins on to the street and told her: “This is what I do and this is how I am and I’m going to stay here and make your life hell.”
Not all the disturbing behaviour was directed at Karen as the couple would sometimes turn on each other - shattering the peace of the whole neighbourhood.
Another neighbour and friend of Cheryl’s, Vicky Dixon, witnessed Cheryl and Rob’s volatile relationship.
She explained: “The arguments and rows kept building and building,” and one night a fight spilled out on to the street.
Vicky went around to Cheryl’s to comfort her and she was shaking and crying.
It seemed like Cheryl and Rob's relationship was over and Vicky spent the whole day supporting her, so was surprised when she saw Cheryl and Rob arm-in-arm together later that evening.
Vicky fumed: “I was ballistic. I went mad.
“I said, 'Get away from me. Turn around and go away.'
“The amount of times he went off and left her and every single time he came back.”
Cheryl had lost all the friends she had in the neighbourhood and Karen didn’t see any improvement in Rob’s behaviour.
Just at the point that Karen had given up all hope, she saw signs that things were about to change.
She said: “You could see trucks with boxes and all their stuff outside. I thought, 'Please tell me you are going.'”
The Prudhams had found somewhere else to live and were moving out for good.
The media attention and general lack of respect for the neighbours is something Karen is not unhappy to have behind her.