A homeowner who terrorised his next-door neighbours for five years has been banned from living and sleeping in his own house in what could be a legal first.

A court order has been imposed on Carl Bridson, 40, after he waged a campaign of harassment on his neighbours by shouting abuse, playing loud music through the night and damaging their car.

He forced Andrew Pennington, 45, whom he nicknamed Teletubby, to retreat to his garage to grab a few hours’ sleep before his early shifts as a postman. Mr Pennington, and his wife Janette, 45, also had blackcurrant cordial poured into their car and a new conservatory flooded and smoked out. Their fence panels went missing and reappeared, cemented into Bridson’s garden, and the CCTV camera that they put up to monitor his behaviour was shot down with an air rifle.

The final straw came when the terrified couple heard Bridson say: “Tellytubby had a chance to move but didn’t, so he’s going to get trouble.”

The couple breathed a sigh of relief yesterday after magistrates in Bolton ordered Bridson to abide by a restraining order that bans him from living in his own home after he is released from a six-month prison sentence for harassing them. He will only be allowed to visit his £85,000 house at set times.

Mr Pennington, of Farnworth, near Bolton, said: “It has taken five years of misery but I hope it shows other people in the same position that they can do something about it. No one should have to go through what we’ve been through. We felt like prisoners in our own home. We had to complain again and again before the police would take us seriously, but they did eventually.”

A spokesman for the Crown Prosecution Service said: “This was an order made for a breach of a restraining order. It is not possible to say whether similar orders have been made before.”

The Penningtons, with their two children Chloe, 19, and Martin, 22, moved into their three-bedroom semidetached home in a new cul-de-sac in 1995. Bridson arrived soon afterwards. For several years there were no problems but trouble apparently began when the couple began to build a new garage at about the time Bridson moved his pregnant girlfriend into his house, with their two children.

Mr Pennington said: “We didn’t know what his problem was. We have never been able to put our finger on it.

“It wasn’t long after that he started putting the music on loud. He would put speakers up close to the walls, turn it up really loud then leave it and go out all day. I would have to be up at 4am for work. Sometimes Bridson would play the music all night and turn it off after I had got up. Then sometimes he would drill and hammer at the walls, at 11pm. He said he was insulating his loft, but who would do it at that time of night?”

Things took a turn for the worse in 2003 when Mrs Pennington left the house one morning to find blackcurrant cordial had been poured through the open sunroof of her car.

Parts delivered for their new conservatory went missing and, when it was finally erected, Bridson sabotaged their shared down-pipe, angling it so that water from the gutters rushed over the conservatory and flooded it.

The couple also claimed that he set up a wood burner outside it, filling it with smoke. The incidents caused damage costing thousands of pounds.

Mrs Pennington said: “We were both exhausted from being kept up virtually every night and now we were living in fear of him. We had no idea what he would do next.”

Bridson was jailed for six months in November for breaching a restraint order.

Explore Law

• Columnists

• Law Panel

• Law Reports

• Student Law

Times Recommends

• UK legal industry faces loss of 10,000 lawyers
• Curious case of chocolate bunny trademark
• Divorce settlement granted after 22 years