Woman with ‘terrifying’ neighbor sues condo board, alleging they failed to stop harassment

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - Not everyone has good neighbors.

But one Kaneohe woman says her next door neighbor at the Yacht Club Terrace complex in Kaneohe has made her life “absolutely terrifying.”

The neighbor has been arrested several times for violating a temporary restraining order and for criminal property damage.

Even so, the woman alleges, her neighbor has continued to pile on the abuse.

And in a case that is now raising questions about a condo association’s responsibility to protect residents from verbal and potential physical abuse, the woman — who asked that HNN only identify by her first name, Lisa — is now suing her condo board, alleging it failed to take adequate steps to stop the harassment.

“The level of anger is just horrifying,” she said.

“A lot of it is directed at me but it’s also directed at other people who live here.”

Lisa added: “She was arrested for chopping down all my landscaping on the front of my property. She went to jail, she posted bail. And the next day she was ripping apart the plants again.”

She said her neighbor once shot a garden hose into her lanai, drenching her and her friends who were having dinner. Another time, she shot her hose at her grandchildren who were sitting on her lanai, she said.

“One night I was in bed, I guess about a year ago. I was in bed sound a sleep — 2 o’clock in the morning — and she just sprayed it on my bed, totally soaked,” Lisa said.

Lisa said many of the incidents were documented on her security camera.

Earlier this year, the camera caught the neighbor swinging away at her plants, ripping off several branches.

The security camera also documented police arresting the woman about two weeks ago. The neighbor struggled during the arrest and said she wanted “to hit” the officer during an expletive-laden tirade.

“Why don’t you shoot me, I want you to shoot me. I want you to shoot me to death,” she tells the officer.

The security camera also captured the woman in 2020 wearing a hoodie, creeping up to her door camera and smashing it with a hammer.

The woman has pleaded not guilty to the misdemeanors and the cases are still pending in court.

In an interview with HNN, she did admit shooting her garden hose at Lisa’s home — once she said to clean bugs and geckos off her wall and another time to quiet her neighbor whom she said was being too loud.

She blamed Lisa for the dispute.

“I moved in, she moved in a year later. I’m from here, she’s from the mainland. She started making a lot of noise up there,” she said. “Because she kept the noise up, nobody would stop her. Her noise every day, every night — it’s like mind boggling.”

Despite the video evidence, Lisa said her condo association has done little to protect her and her neighbors.

While it has fined the woman, the board has failed to take more serious steps like evicting her or barring her from living in her apartment, said Terry Revere, Lisa’s lawyer.

“Many associations will go after people for parking over their line in a parking stall or having a cat. But not willing to do something about this situation is totally outrageous,” said Revere.

“The role of a condo association first and foremost is to provide a safe home environment for their owners, their residents and staff. And that’s clearly not happening here.”

Attorneys for the association could not be reached for immediate comment.

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