Charged for blocking strangers’ car inside HER property

– thought to be in their sixties - in fear and alarm and for five hours refused to release the car to police.

But her lawyer Peter Lockhart said: “My client denies these charges and, as I told the Sheriff, this is a most unusual case.

“A trial may take some time as there are questions of law involved.”

Zoe, who owns a children’s shoe shop business, has been left dumbfounded. She has five hens and horses on her 14- acre smallholding up a single track road amidst stunning Ayrshire countryside. She said: “I am now facing a criminal conviction for the first time in my life.

“Part of the charge states I was belligerent and unreasonable – too right I was, it was my own property and my lawyer said I had every right to be. The thing is 99.9% of people would just have given in to the police pressure and that is what they wanted to give them an easy shift.

“But I was not doing anything wrong, breaking no law by locking my own gate, as they readily admitted when they arrived.

“What has happened to me is not right and I will go all the way with this for the good of people doing nothing wrong and minding their own business in their own home.

“I have been turned from a victim to the bad guy and it cannot be allowed to happen.”

It is understood the Isuzu was parked while the women went to view a stallion in a field nearby. They’d already annoyed a farmer by marching right across his potato crop.

Curiously, they could have parked in a lay- by on the public road just 60 feet away. But returned an hour later to find the vehicle locked in.

Zoe said: “You are quite exposed in the countryside and it is normal for me to close my gates.

“The woman came to my door and I asked them why they thought my property was a public car park.

“I was very annoyed, as anyone would be. I told them they could come back at 8am the following morning to collect the car when the gates would be opened again.”

When the police – a male and female officer – arrived Zoe asked if she was breaking the law and they said no and if she had to speak to them and they said no.

Zoe went on to say: “At that point I went inside and I said I was not coming back out.

“The female officer said they would be breaking the door down. At that point I got my jacket and said arrest me, as I am doing nothing wrong.

“They then called for a second vehicle – again with a male and female officer – and said I was going to open the gates and that would be the end of it.

“I was not going to be bullied and intimidated and made to look as if I was the guilty one.

“They said I was being completely irrational, but this is my home.

“They then handcuffed me behind my back and put me in the tiny cage in the back of their van and driven to King Street police station in Ayr.

“I sat there thinking it was a disgrace, but determined to fight this injustice.

“Inside the cell I was actually thinking that was something ticked off my bucket list, but it was no joke.

“It was not my fault someone had chosen to park on my ground. If someone parked in your drive and went away how would you feel? “This is absolutely ridiculous.” While she was taken to the police station, two officers waited at her property while a third vehicle with another two officers arrived with bolt cutters to break the padlock.”

She was given bail on condition she stays away from the women and faces trial later this year.