- Janine Mackinlay was convicted of harassing Mr and Mrs De Brauwere Brozler
Her trained nose has given Anastasia De Brauwere Brozler a sought-after skill in the perfume industry.
But it also added to her torment when she became the victim of an elderly neighbour who repeatedly threw urine on to the patio of the perfumer’s £5million Chelsea home, a court has heard.
Mrs De Brauwere Brozler, 57, spent months trying to find the source of the ‘disgusting odour’ which was filling the basement garden of the Grade II-listed terrace, and causing her to fear her perfume oils would be contaminated.
She eventually accessed CCTV from the residents’ association which showed Janine Mackinlay, 81, pouring her urine over the railings from a plastic jug up to three times a day.
The commercial landlord, who earns £7,000 a month from renting properties, has now been convicted of harassing Mrs De Brauwere Brozler and her lawyer husband Alain, 60.
Janine Mackinlay (pictured arriving at City of London Magistrates), 81, was seen pouring her urine over the railings from a plastic jug up to three times a day Anastasia De Brauwere Brozler and Alain De Brauwere are pictured leaving City of London Magistrates Scene showing Janine Mackinlay threw urine from her front door (pictured) into the De Brauwere’s basement patio
She was also convicted of causing criminal damage to the couple’s property and ordered to pay £2,922 compensation for repairs on top of £646 in costs.
Austrian-born Mrs Brauwere Brozler, who has created bespoke scents for ‘princes, ballerinas, actors and politicians’, told City of London Magistrates’ Court that the couple called in experts to investigate what they had initially assumed was a sewage leak.
‘Every time you opened the door this pungent smell of urine would enter the house and we could not open our window. There is also a ventilator that is permanently open that drew in the smell,’ the mother-of-two said.
‘It was absolutely disgusting. I had to put scented candles everywhere. We could not use the kitchen and I could not work there even though I need running water.’
A gas expert told the couple the smell was urine, then Dutch-born Mr Brauwere, a Harvard Law School graduate who advises City financial institutions, heard the neighbour’s door slam shut after liquid splashed on to the patio. The couple eventually caught Mackinlay in the act on CCTV footage taken by the residents’ association on the street, which overlooks the Duke of York grounds near Sloane Square.
Mrs Brauwere Brozler said: ‘We could see our neighbour throwing, sometimes three times a day, urine on to our patio.’
When the couple, pictured, confronted Mackinlay, she told them to ‘go to hell’ and ‘back to their own country’, the court heard.
‘I have a trained nose. I am a perfumer that works from home and I know I’m foreign and that is a big problem for our neighbour,’ Mrs Brauwere Brozler, who runs a company named Creative Perfumers London, told magistrates.
Janine Mackinlay threw urine from her front door (seen left) into the Mrs Brauwere Brozler’s basement patio Mackinlay, who earns £7,000 a month from renting properties, has now been convicted of harassing Mrs De Brauwere Brozler and her lawyer husband Alain, 60
‘She is extremely angry to me and verbally abusive to me and my children.’
Mackinlay, a widow who was supported in court by her son and daughter, did not deny throwing urine out of her door but insisted it was not aimed at her neighbours’ property and she did not intend to cause any harassment.
‘I have an arthritic knee and a collapsed vertebra and I cannot always get upstairs or downstairs to the toilet due to mobility issues,’ she told the trial. Holding up the plastic jug, she said: ‘This is the weapon of mass destruction.
‘I wee in it and I dispose of it. I’m afraid to say I throw it out the front door. There is no malice and I have never damaged anyone’s property. It is not very ladylike, I understand that.’
However, she referred to the cost to repair the damage stated in court as ‘laughable’.
Chairman of the bench Jeffrey Manton told the court: ‘This has been deeply distressing to the people living next door.’
Mackinlay was also handed a 12-month restraining order prohibiting her from having contact with the De Brauwere family.