Neighbours refuse to park dispute, court cases pile up
NEW HAMPSHIRE SHORELINE Exasperated judge likens dispute to Looney Tunes
A quarrel between two millionaire families in New Hampshire over parking has escalated into a battle involving allegations of covert videotaping, a woman slapping her bottom derisively and lawsuits in three separate courts.
The feud is so intense that during one court hearing a judge compared the duelling neighbours to Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner.
Former state senator Beverly Hollingworth and her husband, Dr. William Gilligan, a college vice-president, are pitted against real estate agent Kathy Hutchins and her husband, Peter, a lawyer.
Since 1976, Ms. Hollingworth has owned a beach house dubbed “The Barnacle” because of its precarious position atop a cliff in Hampton, N.H. For years, the couple parked their vehicles at the end of Great Boar’s Head Avenue, a dead-end road that offered the only access to their property.
Their makeshift parking lot became a problem after the Hutchins bought a house on the other side of the road in 2004, with its own impressive view of the Atlantic.
Unhappy with Ms. Hollingworth’s parking arrangements, the Hutchins began waging a campaign of intimidation, said David Nixon, the lawyer who represented Dr. Gilligan in one of the many court fights. “It’s not just a neighbour-against-neighbour thing,” Mr. Nixon said. “ It’s a lawyer and his very aggressive realtor wife against two very nice, outstanding, civic-minded, quiet, dignified people.”
Mr. Hutchins filed a civil lawsuit in Rockingham County Superior Court alleging Ms. Hollingsworth has no right to park on the road so close to his new house. He did not return calls for comment. A decision in that case is pending.
Ms. Hollingsworth and Dr. Gilligan allege the Hutchins have used every trick possible to browbeat them into moving their cars, including hammering a nail into a tire, flooding their house with light and repeatedly dousing them with a sprinkler positioned near the parking area — even when elderly guests were present.
During several incidences, Dr. Gillian told Mrs. Hutchins, “ You have no shame” and “ You have no class.”
On the advice of police, Ms. Hollingworth and Dr. Gilligan planted a surveillance camera below the porch of another neighbour and captured the Hutchins on videotape, Mr. Nixon said. The tapes show Mrs. Hutchins hammering the nail into the tire and milling around their neighbours’ cars in an attempt to block them from leaving their parking spot.
And on at least one occasion, as the defendants were leaving the lane, Ms. Hutchins blew them a kiss, then “turned around, crouched over in a manner displaying her backside and slapped her buttocks,” according to a judge’s interpretation of the video.
Mrs. Hutchins was later charged with criminal mischief in Hampton District Court. About a week later, she filed a stalking order against Dr. Gilligan in Manchester District Court. She alleged she became so upset after a confrontation on Sept. 4 that she was taken to an emergency room with heart palpitations.
The stalking complaint caused an exasperated Special Judge Thomas A. Rappa to compare the two families to Looney Tunes characters.
At a hearing late last month, during which the video evidence was presented, he urged both parties to “grow as individuals, have some tolerance toward your neighbours, and some respect,” according to the Union Leader newspaper. He also said they should be celebrating their ability to “own property in arguably one of the most beautiful spots in the world” instead of fighting.
But in the end, Ms. Hollingsworth and Dr. Gilligan won Judge Rappa’s favour, and he dismissed the stalking complaint in a ruling released late last week. It concludes Mrs. Hutchins has “lost reasonable perspective” on the feud and engaged her neighbours with actions that were “both provocative and harassing.”
Dr. Gilligan’s comments — “ You have no shame,” “ You have no class,” and “Madam, I am leaving now, would you please move” — were not threats.
“ The comments … expressing his opinion that [Mrs. Hutchins] lacked class and shame were in direct response to [her] actions,” Judge Rappa wrote in the ninepage judgment.
Mr. Nixon, who defended Dr. Gilligan against the stalking claim, said the ruling is “comprehensive, courageous and correct.” A final hearing on whether the couple can continue parking where they have since the 1970s will be held next month.
“In ordinary circumstances, I would say [the ruling] would give the people on the other side reason to pause and reflect before they proceeded further,” Mr. Nixon said. “In this case, I doubt that will happen.”
Indeed, Mr. Hutchins told a local newspaper “50% of the factual findings in the order are erroneous” and says he plans to fight the ruling.
Mr. Nixon estimates his clients have spent US$200,000 defending their right to park at the end of Great Boar’s Head Avenue. He is urging them to file yet another lawsuit, this time to sue the Hutchins for intentional emotional distress and the destruction of their property.