He's elderly (84 or 85). My house is joined with his. There's a third house that is partially joined to his and they recently had a new kitchen fitted, so there was a lot of drilling in the morning. Since then, he's been blasting the radio on what sounds like a subwoofer aimed against the wall every morning at 7 AM. I live with my brother and my mum, and it wakes us all up. It's a very deep bassy noise so it's hard to block out or drown out. It goes on until 1 PM.
He is doing this on purpose. He did the same thing in 2023 and I went over to his house assuming he didn't know he was being loud and politely told him to turn his TV down in the morning because it's waking us up. Then he told me he's doing it to wake my brother up because "every night at 1:30 AM he wakes me up making wolf noises in the garden so I'll wake him up too since he's obviously not sleeping during the night since he's making noises all night" (foxes frequently visit our garden at night). He's also accused my brother of "cloning my phone", "stealing my water", "stealing my food deliveries", and other crackpot things.
All Summer this year he was blasting one of those 120 dB sirens at 1:30, 2:30, and 3:30 AM each night. He'd then scream at the wall for a minute or two after sounding the siren, seemingly to do with my brother. Sometimes he'd then wake up at 7 AM and immediately go and blast the radio all day. He would also come outside into his garden with a frying pan calling my brother's name. The sirens stopped in July.
The kitchen work on the third house is done and was completed on the 24th of November, but they've left a fridge next to my neighbour's drive. A few days ago he came outside and my mum heard him yell "move your fridge, [brother's name]!".
In August and September and much of October he was quiet but now he's blasting the radio multiple days in a row for weeks on end. I have health problems and don't need this. I have other things going on in my life and recently this was the straw that broke the camel's back and I had a mental breakdown on the 1st of December which caused me to knock stuff off a shelf which caused a very old and very sentimental item of mine to break (I did not mean to break it, just to knock stuff off the shelf). I feel on edge because I can't really sleep early because he also blasts his TV until 12 PM. It's not just the loud noise, it's also the reason he's doing it.
We have complained numerous times to the council (environmental health), as well as the police. They have sent him letters but he has ignored all of them and continues the harassment. He is obviously refusing to take his medication.
He has also called the police on us and we had two police officers arrive at our door because of his slander. All 3 of us are not well, we don't make any noise, and need our sleep. I don't want to move as this was my grandparent's house that was given to us by them after they died.
We are at wit's end here. We just want the harassment to stop. Is there a way we could get him sectioned under the mental health act? From what we know, he stopped taking his medication in 2020. This is when most of the bizarre texts my mum received from him began (she still has them all saved).
edit: For non UK readers, being "sectioned" means being involuntarily hospitalised and forced to take medication
I'm afraid I can't offer any advice, but I can sympathize with your situation.
I've lived in my current house for over 30 years. For all that time our neighbor across the street from us was this older couple and their two dependent adult sons. They were harmless to us, but one was a drunk frequently in trouble with the law and the other had a mental disorder I can't recall that was under control with medication.
That is, until about six years ago. From what I heard 3rd hand, his meds hadn't changed but the manufacturer had changed some ingredient therein, which messed with his dosage. It began innocently enough, a knock on the door around midnight one night. I can't remember if one of us answered the door, but I believe not. Anyway, months pass with no issue until one day when I'm out walking my dog. I hear his mother screaming from her porch and him yelling back from the middle of the street. With my poor vision all I see is a flesh-colored blur. Then when he starts walking I hear bare feet on cement and realize Oh crap he's nekkid!
After this point he starts knocking on our door several times a day. If we failed to answer he wold disrobe and sit down on the bench in front of our house. At least once we forgot to lock the door and weren't there to intercept him right away, and he opened the door and attempted to enter. I was already downstairs and heard the door open and met him before he could do anything. He said something along the lines of "just checking" and left without a fuss.
This was stressful for me as I was home during the day on the days I didn't have class, and was frequently the one to meet him at the door. I also don't have enough vision to evaluate his body language or general disposition, and I knew nothing about his mental illness, so I had no idea whether he was safe to be around.
The worst incident happened while I was at home doing homework. I was downstairs getting a drink of water when I heard the familiar knock at the door. I didn't want to interact with him, I'm already introverted around mentally well-adjusted folks. When I failed to answer right away I could hear him muttering and pacing around our porch. I couldn't go upstairs without him seeing me through the window, so I hunkered down and waited for him to leave, which took a while.
I was taking a MS Windows Server certification course at the time, which included a lot of simulation labs, which would frequently be interrupted by his visits. To this day my heart rate goes up a little when I log into a Windows server.
I believe they eventually got his meds under control, but IIRC he ended up in prison or institutionalized later for other reasons.