 If looks could kill, I'd be a smoldering heap of ash. If you like true revenge stories, you found the best place for your vengeful needs. In this episode, we start off with a story about pirate neighbors, who are illegally broadcasting Dutch terror music. The suffering neighbors make sure to return the favor without holding back. Followed by a viciously brilliant act of legal justice, they can't be touched by a lawsuit, in which a small town boy gets epic revenge on a selfish bad neighbor. Lastly, a story about noisy neighbors messing with the wrong neighbor, who nudges the abomination that is bureaucracy and pointed in their direction, swallowing them whole. Make sure to give the like button a vengeful death stare. Let's dive in. Naturally, viewer discretion is advised. These revenge acts might be disturbing to snowflakes. As we found out that we'd be expecting, not one but two kids, we knew we had to move to a real house with more space. At the time we were still living in a one bedroom studio, one up from the ground floor. With its only entrance being a metal fire escape stairs. Not ideal for a pregnant woman, let alone to live with two small babies. So, we found a privately leased house that was newly renovated and had all the room and a large garden we were looking for. Signed the lease and immediately collected the keys. As the owner drove off, the woman next door comes up to me. She immediately starts demanding we not make noise before noon, as her boyfriend works nights and sleeps in and a whole bunch of other do's and don'ts. So right of the bat we knew, trouble incoming. As the house was fully renovated and not much had to be done, we were like, let's not poke the bear, we'll do the things that make noise after noon. We moved in after two weeks and the whole street was warm and welcoming. My wife was almost due giving birth to my twin daughters, and some offer help with anything we needed, real kind people. They also told us about our neighbors. Nobody liked them. He was a big bully and got into arguments with everybody. Also were known as radio pirates, as in illegal broadcasting on radio with all Dutch bangers, this music is just terror on your ears and possibly used on terrorist black sites. This went alongside them partying Thursday through Sunday till five in the morning. Loud music, constant yelling, always drunk, you get the picture. Really something to look forward to when moving in, certainly with two babies on the way. The partying began immediately, full blast. Real classy for someone demanding to be quiet when douchebag needs his beauty sleep. Then one day, my father-in-law came to put new grass in. He has his trailer parked at the back of our houses, which is public space. Not according to him though, know that exact spot where the trailer was parked, was his spot and we had to move the trailer. Not going to happen, as I was not planning to walk all the way around the house with the sods. He gets angry right away and demanded me to move it, I told him to go freak himself. I was done with him already then and there. I'm also a ginger, so besides having no soul, I do have a temper which is always in check until you provoke me repeatedly. Anyone who knows me will tell you that you really had to make an effort for that to happen. We went on working and the end of the day comes when my father-in-law wants to leave. Hooks up the trailer and bam, there was douchebag, telling him off, yelling it's his spot and he better does not do this again or else. Mess with me all you want, I can handle it, but what you don't do is threaten my family. I ran outside and told him in no uncertain terms to back off or he'll be the sorry one. Total bluff on my side, yes I have that temper but I'm not impressively built and have no hidden fighting skills, but if I have two, I do fight dirty. He backs off, my father-in-law leaves and I go inside where I find my wife crying. She got scared of him potentially doing something to her father or me, and this is something we don't need right now. Combined with hormones from being pregnant and you can paint a picture. So I'm even more pissed, but had to promise not to act on anything. I won't, dear, not yet anyway. Time went on without any real incident and then came the time my wife goes into labor. Didn't go smooth and ended up having to deliver with C-section, because daughter too was almost strangled by the umbilical cord. We had to stay three nights, excruciating nights due to a lot of things. Finally we get to go home, family had put a giant sign in our front yard welcoming the babies. The sign was already up for a few days prior to coming home, so our friendly neighbors definitely knew about it. But did they give a flying frick? No, they did not. From the first night on they started to party and broad blasted their terror music, they started at noon and continued to until five or six in the morning. Classy. They also kept going for days, so it wasn't just Thursday Sunday, it was all week long and the next. So we were broken, hardly slept, one of our daughters suffered from heavy cramps combined with all the noise and her parents at the end of their wits, so she cried a lot. And then I just had it. I researched some things on radio pirates, the laws and regulations and on his large five meter antenna in his backyard which was illegal in itself. But he used it to illegally broadcast on radio which meant he had a lot of equipment to do so, which was even more illegal and can even get you jailed, but at the very least they could seize it all and fine him big time. In the 10 to 45k area. Now, I did not immediately turn him in, but instead went looking for another house to lease first. This because I figured it wouldn't sit well with him and having a wife and two babies in the house alone during the day, because I had to go to work. I hear you guys thinking, why not involve the police? They are utterly useless in cases like this. We called once and what they did disturbs me to this day. They rang at their doorbell and immediately started off by saying we called them about noise complaints. Yes, you read that right. No protection or whatsoever, just blatantly told them we were the reason they're there, told them to keep it down and that was it. They didn't even follow up with us or anything. As you can guess, douchebag now was even more pissed and told me the next day, we're yelled over the fence that separates our backyards that I really should not do that again, a threat yet again of which I told the police. I didn't report it the first time as I chalk that up to alpha male and heat of the moment. But without witnesses to corroborate, nothing could be done yet again. Some days later, I walked out the front door and he just stepped out of his car. Came up to me, demanding I cut back some of our ivy that grew on our side of the fence, because it tangled in with his monster antenna. He said he would be gone for some hours and I could come into his garden to cut back the ivy that grew through on their side. And then a light bulb went on above my head. I told him politely that I would do that immediately. Why? Because that gave me the opportunity to find out the make and model of this antenna to ascertain its signal strength, where the cables go exactly and what kind of cables there were, again to know the signal strength that handled. Also, it gave me a good view on the equipment he had, so I could snap some photographs of it. This was the icing on the cake. Because in the meantime, we did manage to find a new home and already had signed a lease so we would be gone in two weeks. Luckily we only had to paint some walls for the girls' room and furthermore just pack up our things and move them to the other house. So after I trimmed the ivy and collected my evidence, I went online that night to find out the proper channels to report a broadcast pirate and which entity was tasked with catching said pirate. Turned out I had to call the telecom agency, but also the police. Wasn't too happy with the latter. But I remembered I have a nephew that works for the police, officially his area was immigration, but knew enough colleagues that could help us and we could trust not to confront them again saying I was the one that sent them. That was extremely important for our safety when doing what I was doing. So I gave both the agency and the police all evidence I collected, pointed them to the frequencies he pirated so they could listen in. Then they started a neighborhood investigation, which wasn't really necessary, but this was to cover our asses to make it look like he got caught by accident, because they had an active investigation in our area. You never know what he can learn from legal documents and such. We asked them to wait with the raid, yes they raid pirates houses, preferably in the early hours of the day because of his beauty sleep, rendering him incapable of fleeing or hide evidence etc. We moved two weeks later and they raided him two days after we moved. All of his equipment, computers, radios, cell phones and his car were seized. He left in cuffs, his wife did too, for making a big scene and tried to interfere. All of which was life reported to me by one of my ex-neighbors who were equally ecstatic about this. It turned out, this wasn't the first time he got caught but his third time, his car had no insurance on it and failed the vehicle safety test. This would normally have no big consequence, because he didn't drive it while raided, but they had the guy surveilled on for a week and that definitely meant he was seen driving it while not having insurance or safety approved. He was fined somewhere around 30,000 euros, went to jail for 12 weeks and everything seized was destroyed except the car. His wife got to do 40 some hours community service. They had to sell the house, which made for very happy neighbors as they too were over and done with them. Like I said, I do fight, but very dirty. You have to really make an effort for me to get to that point, they did and suffered. Over a year later when shopping groceries I encountered them. With the foulest of looks, if looks could kill, I'd be a smoldering heap of ash. This is a brilliant revenge story, so settle back and relax. This one comes from my boss, who lives in the small town where it occurred. To set the stage, many decades ago, Barney and Betty immigrated from Europe and bought a farm. A few years later they had kids, and sponsored Wilma from the old country as a nanny. She met Fred, a local boy, fell in love and got married. Wilma stayed on as the nanny, and Fred worked as a farm hand. Their kids and Barney and Betty's kids grew up together, and it was pretty much a big, blended family. Years go by, and Barney and Betty decide to sell the farm fields to Farmer Frank, but kept the land the house was on. They made enough off the sale to build a nice, new house, and rezone the property lines. They broke the lot up into two parcels, one for the new house, and one for the existing house, which they gifted to Fred and Wilma as a recognition of their years of dedicated and loving service. Both houses shared a well and a septic field. More time went by. Barney and Betty passed away, and their house was inherited by their son, Bam Bam. Fred also passed away, and Wilma stayed in the house. She was an angel. Everyone in the town knew and loved her, she was like the town's grandmother. She was active in the church, and liked nothing more than crocheting booties for anyone in town that had a baby. Sadly, Wilma passed away too, and her house was inherited by her daughter, Pebbles. She was well established in a nearby metropolitan city, and made the decision to sell the house. And so the trouble begins. To give you a better idea of the setup. Here is a rough diagram. The parcel for sale is the yellow bit, which backs on to protected park land, and is bordered by Bam Bam's land, and farmer Frank's fields. It was purchased by a builder from the city, which will call Dick. The name suits him. He wanted it as a country getaway, as he already had a place in the city. He got approval to improve the place, and his plans were to convert the barn into a multi-car garage with a man cave and an apartment in what was the loft. He started by tearing down the house, with plans to replace it with a bigger, more modern house. The house was torn down, and the new build was started. The lower part of the yellow represents a very narrow driveway, between that driveway and farmer Frank's field was a drainage culvert. So the contractors started parking their vehicles on Bam Bam's lot. Bam Bam asked the contractors not to do it, but they didn't stop, so he approached Dick, and the conversation didn't go well. Dick was an entitled big shot, dealing with what he thought was a country bumpkin. To give you an idea, Dick once went to the local diner, and asked for the wine list. He was aggressive and disrespectful, and this pretty much set the tone for all future interactions. Bam Bam had enough, these contractor trucks were tearing up his ground, so one weekend, he built a fence along the border between his house and Dick's. It wasn't a complicated fence, he just got a buddy with a post hole digger on his bobcat, sunk posts, and strung planks between them. This caused no end of trouble with the build. There was no room to park in the yellow for the contractors without getting in each other's way, and they couldn't park in the driveway which was only wide enough for one vehicle at a time. Contractors were pissed off. They had a long walk from the road to the build site, and had to carry tools and equipment back and forth, either that, or take turns dropping materials. Waiting hours for the carpenters to finish unloading the lumber so that the plumbers could unload the pipes. Dick was furious, and came stomping over to Bam Bam demanding that he dismantle the fence. Bam Bam told him to go to hell. Then a day later, Bam Bam saw that someone had removed some of the fence and the contractor trucks were back on his land. Okay, thought Bam Bam, let's play. The following weekend Bam Bam irrigated the area where the contractors were parking. Irrigated it long and continuously. He probably had to get a water delivery to make it happen, as the well had a limited capacity. On Monday, the first contractor to arrive turned off Dick's driveway to go through the fence, and immediately sank up to his axles in mud. Did I mention that Bam Bam owned the local service station, and knew every tow truck company within 100 miles? As it turned out, everyone they called was too busy to pull the truck out, and they had to call a tow truck from the city, almost two hours away. You can see how the relationship between Bam Bam and Dick became somewhat less than neighborly. Time went by, and Dick's house was completed. It was a low maintenance setup, with interlocking brick over the compound, tall hedges separating Dick from Bam Bam. They kept out of each other's way, but they certainly weren't pals. Dick's kids would come up on the weekend and have a party now and then, but Bam Bam put up with it. One issue that arose was when Dick decided to fill the small swimming pool that he had installed. This drew the well dry, and caused some sand to be pulled into the water treatment equipment. When Bam Bam approached Dick about the cost of the repair through email, Dick basically replied that it was Bam Bam's problem. The same when the septic holding tank needed to be pumped. Bam Bam offered to split the cost of the pumping, and Dick refused to part with a dime. Years passed, and Dick decided to list the house for sale. That's when Bam Bam made his move. He cut the water and capped the septic line leading from Dick's house. Then he informed the real estate agent of what he had done. Well, that induced a thunderstorm, for sure. There's no way Dick could sell a house that had no water, or any way to dispose of waste. He couldn't build a septic field on his property, it was too small. He approached Farmer Frank to buy some of his land, but was rebuffed. His only option would have been to install a septic holding tank, but the only place to put it would have been right in the middle of his compound, and septic tanks can be quite aromatic. It would also have meant removing the in-ground pool. Dick tried to argue in court that he was entitled to access to the well water and the septic field. But Bam Bam won, arguing that Wilma and Fred were given water and septic as a courtesy, and that there was no contractual obligation to provide Dick either well water or septic access. There was nothing in the deed to Wilma and Fred that could be grandfathered in, and Dick's emails refusing to pay for maintenance to either system was the nail in the coffin. The property sat vacant and unusable for months. The price dropped through the floor, and the few people that expressed an interest in the property approached Bam Bam with varying offers of cash to restore service. Bam Bam declined. No offers were made to Dick for the house. Finally, Dick did receive an offer from a numbered corporation, an offer that was about a quarter of the asking price. As is, with a statement that the buyer was aware that there was no water or septic service to the property. Without much choice, Dick accepted the offer. And that's how Bam Bam bought himself a beautiful, modern country home, at a steal of a price. He reattached the water and septic in an afternoon, and moved his furniture down the driveway. He rented his old house out, for extra money, and had the numbered company negotiate with, himself, for an arrangement for perpetual use of the well and septic. Thereby jacking the value of the house by a factor of four. Later, if he decides to sell it, he'll be making a massive profit. Bam Bam now enjoys a country paradise, and is the social king of the hill in his town. All because Dick decided to be a dick. This is a story of how patience is key, and how letting someone else get revenge for you is by far easier than doing it yourself. I live in one of those doubled up houses where they build two houses adjacent to each other with mirrored layout, so we share a wall but are otherwise completely separate. For years, the house next to me belonged to a nice old lady who you never really noticed or had any trouble with. When she died and the house was resold, the troubles began. The target is someone who I will refer to as Jack Sparrow, for reasons that will become clear later. Jack owns a sizable construction business, does some real estate on the side. He buys the house and rents it to a bunch of foreign construction workers that work for his business. I say foreign, because it is relevant to the story. There are rumors jack is doing some shady stuff to have these work for him dirt cheap, by claiming that they're national workers in their native country, and paying them according to that wage, and not the much higher minimum wage of my country. Not exactly on the up and up. Possibly unreported labor as well. Anyways, he stuffs four to six of these in said house for them to live while they work here. Now I do not have anything against foreign construction workers. But these guys living next door have two traits that are very problematic, they are extremely loud and they do not give a frick about anyone else. We're talking nonstop music and partying, starting Thursday evening throughout the entire weekend, until they leave at 5 AM Monday morning to go to work. Seriously I don't know how or when they sleep, it is literally nonstop. We're talking, I'm wearing headphones but still cannot hear my own sound over their music loud. Since it would appear that they've designated the living room, adjacent to the shared wall, as the party room where the fun happens. At first, I do the neighborly thing and just suck it up, thinking it's just one party, just one weekend. After the third one in a row, I go over to ask them to turn it down, since you know, night disturbance. It's technically illegal to blast music this loud, terrible on the street and across the street by my other neighbors who have also complained. I'm met with a half hearted so sorry, will fix. Except nothing changes. I go over several more times, each time angrier, each time met with, but it's not loud. If I can hear your music in my own house, over my own TV and music, I would say that it is in fact, too loud. I contact Jack, since he is their landlord, and explain the situation, after which I met with an abrupt. Sorry not sorry, not my freaking problem. Basically Jack told me to get fricked. So I involve police, and call them every time things get out of hand. After about a dozen calls, sometimes even twice in the same night, it is clear that even regular police interference doesn't help the situation. I should mention that I am a lawyer, so I know what the next legal steps are. I also know that other than a token paper from a judge saying their music is too loud, I'm not really going to get anything. Things would become a cat and mouse game where they would blast their music extremely loud to piss me off or to wake me up, for a few brief moments, so that by the time I could get proof or police show up, there would be no music. I'm deadlocked with my only further option being pretty useless and a waste of time. At this point, I'm biding my time and just waiting till something changes. I'm not saying that I condone people who bludgeon their neighbor to death with a rusty pipe, but I do somewhat understand what would drive someone to that point. One day, I'm at home and I notice quite a lot of ruckus next door, more so than usual. Suddenly, I see through my garden window that a wall is being partially torn down. You see, sometime over the years, the neighbors had built a small adjacent side building adjoining the main house. It was right on the border between us, and when the gardens were being refenced, the wall was used as a divider to save on fencing. Said wall was now in the process of having its top part ripped off by a crane. I was not informed of any of this, which, while not technically needed, would have been the nice thing to do. I go take a walk so I can take a look at what we're doing and see that they've torn down the entire side building, the remaining wall between our gardens is the only part that has been kept intact, and even then, not the top part. Being a lawyer, and specifically, a construction slash permit lawyer, I know two things, do-do like this is not allowed without a pre-approved permit from the city. There is no way in how they have said permit, as I would have seen the application for it, I regularly have to check the public online application to see what permits are being applied for my job, and what I do I tend to look over to my own area, just so I can keep up with what is being planned in my area. This is it. The moment I have been waiting for, the situation has changed and the time has come to exact revenge. A quick email sent to the municipal authorities lets me do my civic duty of reporting a potential crime, the fact that someone is building or demolishing without a permit. Since this is a simple report, no response happens since I'm not an official victim or anything yet. Since no further construction happens for a few days and everything was removed, I assume that was that and they would only tear down the side structure, since it was starting to fall apart due to age. Neighbors have moved all their stuff that was in said building onto their lawn and haphazardly covered it with a tarp. The next week, more construction materials are being delivered and construction starts. I send a new email to city services, with new pictures, saying that apparently, there is more planned, and that I hope they undertake the appropriate action. Instant response less than an hour later, they'd called Jack after the first time to inform him that what he was doing required a permit, and he had ensured them that he didn't know that. B.S., he's in construction, of course he knows, and that he would stop construction and request a permit. They called him again after my email, reprimanded him for not following his earlier promise and he said again he would shut it down. I happened to be working from home that day, and had to stop myself from waving to the construction crew as they left. Later that day, I get an angry phone call from Jack, who accuses me of reporting him and that I would be sorry. He would come after me for damages for his delays. I respectfully inform him that even if I reported him I wouldn't have done anything wrong. Because from the looks of it, he didn't have a permit and should have known that before he started working illegally without one. I end the call before I start to sound too happy with things. Jack has at this point, no idea what I have initiated with this. He is Jack Sparrow and I have just rung the bell that awakens the Kraken that will destroy him, he just doesn't know it yet. You see, there is a good reason why most people consult an expert and or a lawyer when they want to apply for a permit. The rules involved are so convoluted and needlessly complex that navigating them as a non-professional is extremely hard and time-consuming, and a single mistake can torpedo your entire case, forcing you to do it all over. I have killed entire projects and have seen clients' projects killed, by pointing out that on page 127, section 351a, something was left blank that should have been answered. I did some digging and found out that the previous owners of the houses had actually consulted each other about the side building, and agreed on making the wall the divider between their gardens. So much so, that they shared the costs of it. And the ownership. That wall that he destroyed part of? It was also my wall. Which of course, means I'm entitled to damages, but that is not the important part. The important part is that he needs my permission, to do anything to that wall. So when he applied for a permit a few weeks later, I went to city center and looked at the application. Added bonus, neighbor's stuff is still out in the open, covered by just a tarp for weeks now, since they expected this to be a quick smash and replace job that would take a few weeks at most. When I went to look at the application, I noticed that they were planning to do some stuff to said wall that I owned 50%. So I filed a complaint, following proper procedure, about the permit, namely that even if granted, it could never be executed, since Jack needed permission for me in regards to the wall, and he didn't have it, nor was I intending to grant it. This should kill his permit, since permits cannot be granted if you know in advance they cannot be realized. No sense granting a permit to build a certain kind of house when you know they're never actually going to build it. Now, Jack was a bit of a smooth talker, and as a construction entrepreneur, had his connections, and permits are a political decision here just as much as a legal one. So despite a 100% correct legal objection that should have killed his permit, it went through. He actually called me about it to gloat a little. No worry, one can appeal a permit in my country. The only requirement is that you pay a 100 euro fee, which I gladly paid. The appeal instance is a subnational instance, and does not care one bit about Jack's political ties or the half-hearted bullcrap that the city officials wrote to justify granting the permit, in spite of the concerns I raised. They terminate his permit without any hesitation on the aforementioned legal grounds. Jack sees his permit blocked until he fixes the issue, which he can't, because I'm not really inclined to agree with his plans for our wall, you see. At this point, going through two lengthy procedures, it has been over seven months. The neighbors have had an unfinished construction project in their yard the entire time. They were forced to store their stuff elsewhere, something that was always supposed to be a temporary thing for a few weeks while we build, turned into something that was taking months, with no end in sight. But wait, there's more. The above was the administrative part of the matter, him getting the permit. Now doing construction work without a permit is also a criminal offense. And of course, my report got passed around to the appropriate instances, so now Jack was also the subject of a criminal procedure for construction offense. Not only did he risk fines and jail time, he was a construction business and used his own construction business for the work he did on the property. So his company was also on the hook, and one of the sentences that can be given in these types of crimes is to be prohibited to do construction or construction related activity as a business, either permanently or temporarily. Not only was he personally on the line, his entire business was as well. During this debacle, Jack tried to sell the property. This didn't really go too well because of a few reasons. One, the property was inflicted with an illegal situation, the demolished side building was torn down illegally, and until said illegal status was resolved, it would stick to the property. Which tends to kill the property value quite a bit, since nobody wants to buy something that they'll have to spend time and money on to make legal again, by either rebuilding the torn down building, or getting a regularization permit for it. Made even worse by the fact that he applied for said permit and had it denied, so he couldn't even claim that said permit would be super easy to get. Secondly, is Jack never intended to sell the property in its current state? What he has done in the past, is buy cheap old houses like the one next to me. He puts some of his crew in it, who can't complain about the sub-par accommodation. They thrash the place because they don't care and he lets them, then when the place is done, he tears it down and sells it to a developer or develops it himself. However, due to his construction crime and the accompanying status for the property, step two was not an option. He couldn't renovate it the way it needed to be, small renovations would not be enough, because covering the crime was always a requirement in any permit he would request for the building, and because of me, he couldn't cover it. Couldn't sell it either, because the place was trashed, and any developer looking it would dip out when they realized there was a construction issue and a vocal neighbor who would oppose anything big that they would try to do there, lost of easier properties to develop than that one. In conclusion anyway, that is where we are today. Jack is staring down the barrel of a criminal court procedure that is about to happen where he is risking his business and livelihood. His existing projects also gather special attention from city services now, since he is now outed to them as someone who cuts corners on permits and regulations. He cannot really sell the property unless he cuts a massive loss, since in its current state it is absolutely trashed. He cannot develop it or sell to a developer, because all development plans involve the adjoining wall, which he cannot use in big ways unless he gets my permission. The rowdy neighbors are stuck living in a smaller house than what they had, in a place they trashed but that cannot really be renovated or fixed in the major way that it needs. They have quieted down a lot, possibly because Jack blames them for his current situation, which isn't wrong, I suppose. I have awakened the Kraken and set it off on Jack Sparrow, and it utterly ruined him. And the best part is that I had to do very little to do it. All I really did was nudge the abomination that his municipal bureaucracy and pointed in his direction, and they did the rest. I could tell you that he called me to complain and even beg about letting him use the wall the way he needs it to, so that he can get on with his business and fix the issues and use them to show his good faith in court and the criminal procedure. That he was losing money and customers over this and was in danger of losing his entire business, and that I then smugly replied with, not my freaking problem. But he didn't, so for now we'll just have to imagine that he did. Thank you for enjoying this episode, which was made with artificial love. Subscribe or give royal ASMR sugar by avenging the like button. Could you imagine doing one of these acts yourself? Share your experience below. I'll join the conversation.