Tear down Halloween display, police tell cafe owner
TWO boys stare aghast at a fake murder scene, complete with mutilated mannequins, severed limbs and lots of blood.
But they aren’t visiting the hall of horrors at the local fair – they’re walking past a cafe in town.
Passers-by were so horrified by the gruesome display, which also featured a massacred baby doll, that they complained to police.
Now officers have ordered the owner to take down part of the Halloween scene in the Memory Lane Cafe, in Leigh Park, Havant, saying it breaches anti-social behaviour legislation on the grounds of taste and decency.
Ian Payne has removed the baby from the display – which is part of local Halloween window decorating competition – but has defiantly kept the rest in place.
Together with wife Debbie, he spent four days setting up two adult dummies covered in ‘blood’, with the slaughtered baby on the sitting figure. A plastic child with a knife embedded in his head still lies on the ground.
Mr Payne, 51, said: ‘The baby did look gory but it was just tomato sauce. More people loved it than hated it.’
However, Lorraine Blackburn, 32, who lost her son Owen at three months old and lives nearby, said: ‘It’s just wrong – it’s sick. I don’t know why they would include something like that. Surely it would make people avoid the place rather than stop there.’
Leigh Park Councillor Mike Fairhurst said: ‘I haven’t seen it but if it had a mutilated baby in the window he has obviously gone too far.
‘He has made a mistake and I’m glad he has taken it down.’
Hampshire Constabulary said: ‘Officers have spoken to the business owner to make them aware of concerns raised by members of the public and the display has subsequently been altered.’
Last week Tesco was forced to remove a Halloween mask from its shelves after complaints from mothers. The £15 zombie head featured blood-spattered teeth, open wounds and a rat disappearing into its mouth.
Have you seen a macabre Halloween scene? Email news@dailymail.co.uk