Photo: @livingrichardson / TikTok / ronstik / Shutterstock
He says he wants to look at the basin on her property.
By Megan Quinn — Written on Aug 22, 2022
A mother took to TikTok seeking the opinion of other users after claiming that her neighbor installed a ring camera at the edge of his property.
The problem is that the camera peers directly into the mother’s property — including her backyard and windows to her home. Her attempts to block the camera were unsuccessful, as her neighbor would just move the camera to a different angle where he could see her property clearly again.
The video where the mother, Samantha Richardson, detailed her predicament was originally posted to her TikTok account, @livingrichardson has generated over 4 million views.
“Some of you may know that we were in a dispute with our neighbors, and now I need your opinions and advice about something,” Samantha started her video.
She said her neighbor's camera is pointed over his fence and looks into her yard.
Ring cameras are typically used to monitor one’s own property. However, Samantha claims that her neighbor had his camera angled allowing him to see into her entire backyard, and windows of her home that looked into the living room and all three of the bathrooms.
To block her neighbor’s view that the camera gave him, Samantha says her husband and she placed a temporary barrier. “We just stuck a lattice up there to block the angle range of what his camera could see,” she explained.
She added that her neighbor’s camera could still see down his fence line, but could not access the back of her house.
After a month, Samantha realized her neighbor moved his camera down the fence line past the lattice so that the camera could capture its original angles. At this point, Samantha believed that her neighbor was violating her family’s privacy.
She expressed her concern about her eleven-year-old daughter using the rooms where the camera had access to change clothes daily.
She decided to have a sheriff come to the house to see what the police could do regarding the matter.
“Clearly he is trying to see the back of our house. There was no reason he should have moved the camera after we put a block up,” Samantha said.
The sheriff agreed that the neighbor's actions were immoral, however, there was nothing he could do about it legally. Instead, he went over to the neighbor’s house and kindly asked him to move the camera.
The neighbor claimed that he had his camera set to the particular angle he placed it at so that he could see a basin that was on Samantha’s property. However, Samantha says that the basin was on the opposite end of her property where the camera was installed.
Since there was nothing the police could legally do, Samantha and her husband added another piece of plywood connecting to the lattice to once again block the camera’s views.
The following morning, they noticed that the camera was moved once again allowing their neighbor to view their backyard. Samantha shared that at this point all they can do to block their neighbor’s view of their property entirely would be to build a bigger fence, which they would need permission from the city to do.
“He is clearly moving this camera. We have put up multiple barriers and he doesn’t care and he wants to see into the back of our house and our entire backyard, and I have three children,” Samantha shared, visibly frustrated.
She added that there is a “high probability” that she will have to take her neighbor to court to dispute.
She asked her followers if there was anything else she could do to keep the situation from escalating.
“I’d put a big sign in my front yard asking why he feels the need to look at my children in my windows? Let the neighborhood know; call him out,” one user commented.
“How about installing stroking lights racing the fence line that would ruin the exposure? Bright for day, infrared for nights,” another user suggested.
Samantha posted a follow-up video responding to a comment that suggested she and her husband confront their neighbors themselves. “We’ve tried to talk to them multiple times, and of course, they’re claiming that we will not communicate with them,” she says.
She added that her neighbors refuse to interact with them on the situation.
Despite her predicament, Samantha has managed to maintain a sense of humor about it. She posted several videos to her account poking fun at her current situation, including one of herself flipping off the camera.
Megan Quinn is a writer at YourTango who covers entertainment and news, self, love, and relationships.