Cut a Fence Too Far

THIS weekend a fence was again cut at Glenbawn Dam onto private property and it was the last straw for a family who are constantly contending with people trespassing, camping, lighting fires, cutting fences on their private land and letting their cattle out.

They never used to mind a few people climbing the fence to cast a fishing line if they did the right thing on their property, but now there is a blanket ban and no trespassing will be tolerated.

A blue Honda CRV dumped in the Dam causing another headache for the Simpson family.

“We can’t even go away for a day, on the chance that someone will cut the fence and our cattle will get out and I’d hate to see someone get hurt or damage their car because they have hit a beast, we’d lose another beast, but someone could lose their life and we’d be liable,” Mrs Simpson said.

“If people wanted to go in and fish we didn’t have a problem, but now we do,” she said.

“We’ve battled with this for too long, rounding up cattle, constantly fixing fences, but this weekend takes the cake with someone deliberately driving a car into the dam, but they haven’t crashed through the fence, they have deliberately cut the fence then driven the car into the water.

“The car in the dam was completely covered in water up to the top of the windscreen, the windscreen has been smashed and there were kids throwing rocks at it, while our cattle were out again.

“At first we worried someone could have been in there, but fortunately that wasn’t the case.

“The key to the car was in the ignition, the plates were taken off it and it may have been stolen, but I think it is more likely an insurance job, the police are looking into it now.

“In order to get it out, there is a hell of a lot of paper work to get it out and it might be six months before you can get to it to tow it out.

“The amount of rubbish we find all over our property and the amount of fires that people light and it’s easy for fire to get away from people and again it could not just damage our property but someone could get hurt,” said Pam Simpson.

It is stress that Pam and her family do not need since the premature birth of their grandson earlier this year.

UPDATE: This article has been modified at the request of another family member to delete details about the baby.

While Pam and her family have been happy for people who do the right thing to fish on their land, they have now had enough and all trespassers will be prosecuted.

Pam recounts many stories of people cutting their fences, camping on their property while high on ice, fires unattended and being abusive to them.

For a family which is coping with so much they will now take the ladder down and implore the local community to do the right thing and not trespass.

People with any information are encouraged to phone Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or Muswellbrook Police Station on 02 6542 6999