An 82-year-old woman visited by police at night after she was reported for having a socially distanced cup of tea with neighbours in the communal garden where they lived.
The pensioner was watching television in bed later in the day when police knocked on the door of her sheltered housing complex home to say she had been reported. Police had been told that she and three others were seen drinking teas at 1.30pm that day.
Her 56-year-old daughter, Lesley Magovern, told GloucesteshireLive : “My mother heard a knock at the door and it was very late and she wondered really who it could be. My mother is quite deaf and she asked who it was and she thought the voice said ‘It’s me’. Then mother assumed it was in fact me and she then opened the door.
“There were two officers stood there, a man and a woman with masks on and they asked if they could come in and speak to her. They did not show her any identification so she just trusted the uniform and she was quite frightened. My mother has never been in trouble with the police in her life.”
She says she is disgusted at what she had been told by her mother, so the next morning she filed a complaint with the police. The residents all share a communal garden and Lesley's mother moved in just before lockdown came into force. She said she could not believe the police travelled to visit her elderly mother "for something so ridiculous".
She said: “When they were there, they told mother if it were to happen again she would be fined. Then they asked her to provide identification so she was rooting around trying to find some. Finally she ended up showing them an out of date drivers licence as that is all she had.”
Mrs Magovern does not believe her mother deserved this warning or to be disturbed at such a late hour. She said: “I made a complaint to the police station. As soon as my mum opened the door the worst things began racing through her mind.
“Then the police wee about to start knocking on the others doors. However mum and the other neighbour had to tell the police not to do it because the other lady involved has poor health and they said they would talk to her about why the police were there. I really do not understand why the police thought a few elderly folk drinking tea, socially distanced in a communal garden is a priority.
“My son works for the London Met and even he could not believe what I was telling him. We all have been left thinking, what a waste of police resources.”
The officers that visited Mrs Palmer are part of the Covid response team.
A Gloucestershire Police spokeswoman said: “An officer has spoken to the complainant and an explanation was provided in response to concerns raised. She was content with this and the matter has been resolved.
“Police received a report of a potential Covid breach on Tuesday 9 March at 1.30pm suspecting that there was a gathering involving people from multiple households in a residential garden in Charlton Kings, Cheltenham. Covid response officers attended later that day at around 9.45pm where some residents were spoken to and given words of advice around current restrictions.
“Officers are deployed to incidents based on an assessment of the threat, risk and harm of the incident and in this case officers who are part of the Covid response team and are deployed across the county attended later that evening.”
