My village isn't as superior as many villagers thought.

We live in a quiet and peaceful village. Quite a few years ago we were asked by the Serious Crimes Unit if they could mount a surveillance from our bedroom window on the house opposite. A few weeks later there was an armed, dawn raid on the property ( which we slept through!) We never found out exactly what the crime was but think it was the import and export of drugs. What better cover than a quiet, prosperous village?

As your village is situated not far from the big city that is probably why they chose it. Somewhere out of the ordinary and if the house was detached then not too much strong smells escaping. Possibly people that keep themselves to themselves criminals also like that. I wonder how much cannabis was in there bang goes their profit margin I bet they are not happy bunnies.

I think there will be many on here who remember when villages were not for the affluent, or a 'lifestyle choice'. When I was a child, there was local concern about children in village schools getting poor education - now people flock from the towns to go to a 'village school'. I also remember when village properties were cheap, because comfortably-off people preferred to be in towns.
It seems now that people think that if they move to a village they can buy into some imagined lifestyle, but it isn't always so.

Sara1954

Callistemon
Well exactly, you can’t do much with the stone tops, the bottoms are cemented in, so it was probably too much trouble to take then.

I'm planning on putting stone tubs in an awkward bit of garden at the front, the theory being they'll be too heavy to lift, but perhaps not!

I have heard about pampas grass on the front lawn
Our neighbours have some of that on the front lawn

Callistemon
I think if it’s not nailed down (or cemented down) they’ll have it .

I have never heard about having pampas grass on the front lawn.

The cemetery where my late parents are buried has nice grass edging as you drive in and I have always admired the pampas grass that looks so graceful there.
No sign of drug dealers any where there it is always totally quiet.

Sara1954

Callistemon
I think if it’s not nailed down (or cemented down) they’ll have it .

We may have to cement them down.

I say we - I haven't suggested this to DH yet.
I feel a re-think coming on.

I often wonder how many of them are housing crooks, money launderers, etc., especially when one of the older, lovely but fairly unassuming-looking houses is demolished to make way for a much larger one that frankly looks like an ostentatious WAG-palace

That happens a lot on the estate where I live Witzend.
Several episodes of Vera have been filmed in this part of Northumberland and yes the villains often reside in the poshest houses ?

“It is my belief, Watson, ..... that the lowest and vilest alleys of London do not present a more dreadful record of sin than does the smiling and beautiful countryside.”

Sherlock Holmes knew.

I was brought up in Scotland’s central belt. When I moved to rural Yorkshire my neighbours seemed to think I’d come from a “war zone” to a “rural idle”. All well and good, except for the local turkey-farm. The farmer had been on crimewatch a few years before pleading for his wife to come home. But “human remains” were found with the turkey entrails!

vampirequeen I agree with you.

It reminds me of a weekend course I went on a few years ago when the subject of domestic violence and sexual assault was raised in one of the discussions. One of the women there was outraged and said she hadn't envisaged a weekend discussing this sort of sordid matter, stating "I live in a very nice village and we don't have that sort of thing there". Really?

I would hate to live in a village that was perfect in every way. One of the attractions of the village I live in are that it contains a cross section of people, all incomes, honest and dishonest. Sadly, even a murder about 25 years ago, just before we moved here. A man took out lots of life policies out on his wife, then killed her and tried to claim on the policies. Her parents still live in the village.

One of the joys of village living is the way all kinds of housing from council through to the most expensive are all cheek by jowl. We live in one of the more expensive houses in our village, with little or no front garden, overlooking the school, next but one to the pub and looking at a terrace of small single story bungalows that used to be farm cottages.

A large coastal village I know seems to have alarming rates of drug peddling, suicide, drunkenness. A tiny village in posh Surrey where a relative lived turned out to have a safe house housing a mental patient who entered the house of a neighbouring family and held them up at gunpoint.

If feeling superior makes people feel happy and safe, as long as they don't offend others it really doesn't matter?
We are all ordinary people trying to lead a happy life wherever we live.

From what I have heard from a friend who is a police officer, villages like yours are prime positions for cannabis farms as the criminals think that no one will be looking somewhere like your village - how wrong are they ?
I can probably bet that people near the house in question have smelt the cannabis and just written it off as a bonfire or passing traffic smells in ignorance!

Callistemon

^I have heard about pampas grass on the front lawn^
Our neighbours have some of that on the front lawn

Just be wary if they invite you in for drinks.......

For folk that think cannabis skunk is no deal - the reality if you live next door to it (adjoining) it ruins your quality of life , sleep deprivation & own space is polluted with fumes . Certainly not a situation where you want small grandchildren to be. Fresh air in village enhances health & well being

My neighbour pulled onto the village school car park with her windows down and someone threw a bag of drugs onto her passenger seat and drove off. When she reported it to the police they said they would monitor the car park but it was rife in these little villages as we are off a main A road and it's easy to 'get away'

It's only the villains of society that can afford gated mansions !

Nowhere is crime free, and criminals all live somewhere!

That illusion is why I think records should be public. I know it would be very hard at first, but we would be living in the real world. I, and I'm sure many of my very respectable friends have 'skeletons'. Hacks me off to hear them demanding the youth vandals should be hung.

Posh villages....white collar crime....tax evasion....dodgy deals....cronyism..... All as morally indefensible and damaging to society as burglary, theft, any crime more usually associated with urban areas.

The safest place I ever lived was the roughest part of a city.

Nobody stepped over the line on that patch.

(We won’t mention what went on outside it)

We were burgled, we lived in a desirable village on the edge of a large port city. Drugs were coming in all the time through the port and the police tried their best.
I came in to find all electricals gone some with the plug cut off. Jewellery mine and families cameras you name it. They even stole some bedding to take it away.
The police caught the culprit when he was attempting another break in a nearby village. The police told me it was a good thing I was not in the house at the time as he was violent and always high on drugs. I told neighbours thinking they would be interested some were others chose just to be glad it was not them.
Drugs are everywhere and used by a lot of people you would not expect. He was also involved in growing cannabis in a house he rented.
Now Suzie woosy what's your take on that? True or false ? helpful to others or not.