A couple say their lives were made hell by a neighbour from hell who spent 18 months terrorising them through their Ring doorbell.
Ben, who does not wish to give his surname, bought his first flat in Wandsworth, southwest London, back in 2022.
But the 32-year-old’s troubles began when council tenant Drina Gray moved into the flat below the following April.
After reporting her for kicking her dog – which he says he caught on CCTV – the 51-year-old launched into a ‘relentless’ campaign that made Ben and his partner Emma prisoners in their own home.
In the months that followed, Ben claims his neighbour smashed three doorbell cameras in less than a year, issued regular chilling threats via cameras and took her dog to defecate on their doorstep.
The product manager says he even lost his job at a startup company because of the lack of sleep he was getting due to Gray blasting loud music and hoovering the communal hallway in the early hours of the morning.
Countless disturbing videos captured by Ben’s cameras show Gray shouting, swearing and threatening him.
Then, after Gray was finally prosecuted for her campaign of hate and a judge ordered her into custody last month, she absconded and went on the run for weeks.
Drina Gray was captured on Ring doorbell footage verbally abusing her neighbours Ben and Emma, even smashing their doorbells during the relentless two-year tirade
Gray, who lived below the couple in their Wandsworth flat, seen showing her middle fingers up
The CCTV cameras even captured her taking her dog upstairs to dirty their doorstep
She has now been tracked down and will be sentenced next month – following at least five adjournments in her case.
‘It has been quite an ordeal for the last 18 months or so,’ Ben said. ‘It has been horrendous. That’s the only way I could describe it.
‘Nothing was getting done for a long time. It’s just the two of us in the block. It was a strange situation.’
Ben says he has issued multiple complaints to both Wandsworth Borough Council (WBC) and the Metropolitan Police about their handling of the situation.
He claims that when Gray once threatened to ‘shoot’ him and his partner Emma, a 30-year-old who works in marketing, police took ’13 hours’ to respond.
When his council tenant neighbour first moved in downstairs, Ben says he did the neighbourly thing of introducing himself and telling her to contact him if she ever needed any help.
He said: ‘She was alright [at the start] – apart from playing loud music all through the night. But at that point, there was nothing aggressive or violent.
‘I was constantly messaging her, saying: ‘Could you keep the music down?’. It would go straight back up again. It was relentless. Every single night.
‘She was pet-sitting as well and there were four dogs barking and howling. That in itself was really bad, but because it got so much worse it doesn’t seem like it.
‘Compared to having death threats it was not that bad, but it was terrible as well.’
However, around six months after she’d moved, Ben reported Gray to the RSPCA for kicking her dog and things quickly took a ‘nasty’ turn.
He said: ‘She knew [the footage of the alleged kick] was from my CCTV camera – which I put there because she was stealing my parcels.
Pictured: Gray storming towards Ben and Emma’s doorbell. During the course of two years after she moved in in April 2023, she made death threats and told them she would ‘shoot’ them
Gray can be seen through the window trespassing in her neighbour’s garden. Ben said that when he tried to have a barbecue last year she lit a ‘gigantic bonfire’ in the garden, prompting him to call the fire brigade
‘That’s when it really started turning nasty.
‘The psychological impact of her living below really does stick with you: we were thinking and even dreaming about it.
‘She was three metres away from us at any time and we had to walk past her door to leave the property.’
Ben collected dozens of clips of Gray’s ‘violent, intimidating’ threats on his cameras, having been instructed to collect evidence by WBC.
He continued: ‘She threatened to burn down the flat, that we were going to get jumped, for my partner to watch her back when she comes back alone – really malicious stuff.
‘She used the cameras as a means to communicate with us. She often activated the Ring doorbell at two or three in the morning. She smashed three of them.
‘She was constantly letting her dogs out to foul on our doorstep.
‘We tried to have a barbecue last year and she lit a gigantic bonfire in the garden. I had to get the fire brigade out.
‘It was relentless. Everything I did she impacted in some way or another.’
Gray eventually landed in court, with her neighbour having compiled a dossier of more than 200 separate incidents.
In December, she admitted using threatening words or behaviour, destroying Ben’s property and failing to comply with a community protection notice.
However, already on bail on animal welfare charges, Gray was bailed again for a pre-sentence report to be prepared.
Another occasion on which Gray was captured on doorbell footage showing her middle fingers
Ben and Emma say they had reported the incidents to police on countless occasions, and action was only finally taken after they compiled a dossier of more than 200 incidents
Ben says police and council failures in the case meant her sentence was postponed on two further occasions.
He spoke of his frustration at both WBC and the police for mistakes and oversights that led to the case being postponed time after time, with seemingly no end in sight.
‘The council just told us to keep logging the reports,’ Ben said. ‘We were up to about 200 incidents when we thought, “What is the point in this?”
‘It was absolutely infuriating. It has been eye-wateringly slow to the point where the council have said they intend to take back ownership of the property.
‘They knew she was going to be a nightmare – she was moved from her previous two addresses.
‘Once, she threatened to shoot us… It took police 13 hours to respond to that call. I had to follow up four or five times. I know police are overstretched but there are still protocols that need to be followed so people are safe.
‘I understand why people get to the point where they take the law into their own hands.
Gray’s tirades became so frequent that Ben lost his job to the lack of sleep his neighbour was allowing him.
Gray’s tirades became so frequent that Ben lost his job due to the lack of sleep his neighbour was allowing him.
‘The sleep deprivation really took a toll on my mental health,’ he admitted. ‘I wasn’t sleeping at all, really, because of the noise and the torment.
‘I had a team underneath me and I couldn’t hold conversations because I was so tired and drained. Every time my phone went off I lost my focus. I lost my job last summer.
Ben had installed cameras after suspecting his neighbour was stealing his deliveries. On one occasion, clothes from an order were found under the stairs opened with their labels cut out
Pictured: A Reiss label that the couple claim was left cut out from their order which was found under the stairs in a Lidl bag
‘It’s a lot to deal with on your own. We haven’t had any help or support. I’ve put hundreds of hours into this. It has been life-consuming.
‘I’m between two agencies and no one’s taking responsibility. If I don’t do it, nothing gets done.’
Gray was finally dragged back to Wimbledon Magistrates’ Court at the end of last month for sentence – but Ben says it was again pushed back for a third time, as a pre-sentence report had not been completed.
He said that, as Gray had broken a court order as many as nine times since her original conviction, a judge finally opted to remand her into custody.
However, her defence barrister claimed she was too disabled to be transported and would have to self-transfer, but later absconded from the court.
‘Just as we thought it couldn’t get any more ridiculous,’ Ben said, adding he has now submitted complaints to the housing ombudsman.
He claims that after submitting complaints to the police for their handling of his case, he was told he should receive a response within ’24 hours’.
‘It’s been the best part of seven months now,’ Ben said. ‘It’s like banging your head against a wall.
‘Why wouldn’t you lose faith in the justice system? It’s obviously not there to protect you. It’s beyond absurd.’
Scotland Yard say Gray has now been tracked down and placed into custody, but did not mention where she was recently caught whilst on the run, nor address Ben’s accusations about the handling of his case.
A spokesperson said: ‘At approximately 05:30hrs on Friday, 14 February a 51-year-old woman was arrested at an address in Strathdon Drive, SW17 for breaching existing bail conditions that had been imposed at court.
‘She remains in custody.’
Pictured: Yet another occasion on which Gray walked up to the camera to shout abuse. The women broke bail conditions and went missing, but Scotland Yard say she has now been tracked down and remanded in custody
Cllr Aydin Dikerdem, a WBC Cabinet member for housing, said he accepted the authority could have acted faster following Ben’s serious complaints about his neighbour.
‘Wandsworth Council takes crime and anti-social behaviour (ASB) very seriously, and we work with partners to both support residents and to take the appropriate action against those responsible,’ he said.
‘This is a complex case where housing officers have been working closely with a number of different agencies, including the Police, to resolve the matter.
‘An ASB Case Review was completed and recommendations were made, with the community safety team engaging with the affected neighbours.
‘Following the recent criminal hearing, the Council have obtained an injunction to prevent this individual returning to the property and we are continuing to seek possession of this property.
‘We accept that we could have acted more swiftly, and following this case changes are being made to our ASB case management system to ensure the appropriate actions are taken more promptly and that complainants are kept updated.
‘Council officers have met with the individuals affected to discuss what further support could be provided.’
