A nuisance caller has been convicted of bombarding police with calls to 999 and being verbally abusive to staff.
Ashleigh Tighe made a total of 54 calls to Northumbria Police over the course of last year claiming she had been a victim of numerous crimes including assault, harassment and theft.
But Tighe, 36, regularly failed to attend appointments after reporting the alleged crimes and was found to be intoxicated and abusive towards control room staff on several occasions.
Tighe was warned in July 2018 about her misuse of the police’s telecommunication system and was spoken to following several complaints made to officers about her behaviour towards neighbours.
But the warning was not heeded, and Tighe – who phoned 101 and 999 more than 20 times between August and December – was subsequently served with a Community Protection Notice.
After the nuisance calls continued, Tighe was later charged with one count of persistently making use of a public communication network to cause annoyance, inconvenience or anxiety, and one count of failing to comply with a community protection notice.
Earlier this year (February 16), Tighe appeared before magistrates in South Tyneside who heard her behaviour constituted an “unnecessary use of police resources”.
Tighe, of James Street, Sunderland, pleaded guilty to both offences.
On May 24, she was handed a 16-week sentence, suspended for two years, and handed a five-year restraining order preventing her from contacting two individuals.
Superintendent Paul Stewart, of Northumbria Police’s Communications Department, said:
“Hundreds of calls come into our communication centres every single day, and we want to be able to deliver an outstanding service to everyone who gets in touch.
“While the overwhelming majority of calls we receive are genuine and made in good faith, there are some occasions when individuals abuse the 999 and 101 numbers and make nuisance calls.
“The last thing we want is for people to have to wait on the phone to speak to one of our call handlers, but this type of unhelpful behaviour can have an inevitable impact on how quickly other emergency calls are answered.
“We would always ask the public to work with us so that we can ensure those unfortunate enough to be involved in serious incidents can receive police assistance as quickly as possible.”
Magistrates were told Tighe contacted police just days after being handed a Community Protection Warning in July 2018 claiming she had suffered a broken arm following an alleged assault.
However, it later emerged that she sustained the injury falling off a wall.
Over the next few months, she reported several other crimes but failed to attend subsequent appointments, and on one occasion claimed she “couldn’t remember” why she had contacted police.
Tighe was served with a Community Protection Notice in October 2018, which she refused to sign.
In February this year, she was charged with breaching the notice, as well as for persistently making use of a public communication network to cause annoyance, inconvenience or anxiety.
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Seen situations like this before when police make it very hard for you to even make a statement through affinity bias and also confirmatory bias. The individual then becomes so frustrated and let’s off. Doesnt matter how she articulated herself police ARE very good at what they do in the essence of making it seem that one does not make statements. They never think that individual could be more at risk by doing so. They never think that they have let some people down so much that most of us have lost faith in you guys as a whole including me.
To the point essex police lied and said they had not been out on a day I was at work and hand posted a letter. This was after I actually emailed them details about my working hours and times. Then I’ve called switchboard many times to leave voicemail for Mr Drake who seemingly never not got them. Each time I’ve been physically or verbally attacked they never attend straight away then attended at 6am in the morning shining a torch in my face and another time at 11pm at night. After suffering abuse being manipulated attacked and your already down they know very well it makes you feel like what’s they point. Leaving them free to abuse the system write fraudulent, dehumanising, defamation of character notes, fraudulently lie to the local MPS and they and orchestrate things in those peoples lives.
I’m not saying this girl didnt call up but I can 100% be certain that she was at the end of her tether had no where to turn so was pushed to a point. Bet if you released all of them call recordings we would see a completely different side of the story.
Those of you that do do this makes me wander why your in the job. Because that is not serving and protecting that’s looking like bored police finding ut hard to catch real criminals with no time on their hands to make correct referrals.
And tweeting peoples personal stuff when you can not even be bothered to look fully into it. Biased behaviours what is this world coming to.
Let’s hope the virus gives alot of you a new fresh outlook on what’s really important in life.
Being liked….
Hitting that target…
Supporting a colleague who has made illegal processes…
Your police not social media whores use it for the greater good this is petty.
Or doing the right thing by human kind!!!
DO MORE DO BETTER the other organisations you often work alongside are also not honest in information they pass on to you at times. Needs more stringent to protect those that are really innocent and get beaten down so much they start behaving like they have no tomorrow as that’s how it really feels for them.
And I was also told I was not allowed to make a statement at all regards my past cases even though I have been obstructed.
Please informs essex police that I am more than serious about making statements about every single one of my cases I left a few messages in order for someone to contact me each time.
Using an excuse of changing numbers is not acceptable.
I urge anyone who feels they are failed by police
Request your dsars from them including call recordings
to first try thei local mps send as much evidence as possible even call recordings yourself and then write them up as transcripts to take to court if you feel you have been misled.
complaining to police station I’ve usually never gotten anywhere one sergeant actually out the phone down on me. Another told me my cases were closed but I could open them again at any time twice I’ve been told that. Another told me I can only report things within 6 months of the crime being committed.
IOPC office unfortunately also did nothing but passed it on to just another sergeant in the same area.
My last step
I’m personally taking it to the high court now so that I can get my DSARS, justice for the obstruction and also rectification rights to have everything false and goaded withdrawn. Its effected my life a great deal and whilst I was homeless after being sexually abused.