the times | Saturday April 9 2022 39
News
In the year before Matthew Boorman
was murdered by a neighbour he suf-
fered a mental breakdown under the
stress of repeated death threats against
him and his young family.
The father of three was placed on
medication as he and his neighbours
pleaded for help from the police and
local authorities to deal with a reign of
terror by Can Arslan, which began over
a parking dispute.
Arslan, 52, who had a personality dis-
order diagnosed, was told last Tuesday
that he would be jailed for life in June
after a jury at Bristol crown court re-
jected his claim of diminished responsi-
bility and convicted him of murder.
Sarah Boorman, the dead man’s
widow, said the response by police and
local authorities to their warnings
about their neighbour had been “tooth-
less and ineffective”.
The Times has reconstructed the
steps taken by the authorities to deal
with Arslan’s behaviour before he
stabbed Boorman to death in Walton
Cardiff, Gloucestershire, last October.
However, a former officer and senior
policing leader told The Times that “it
appears all the relevant legislation was
being used against this individual” but it
had little effect. He said “separating the
parties” was required during disputes
but existing powers make it hard to
evict people from private accommoda-
tion or to force them to leave an area.
Arslan also stabbed Mrs Boorman in
the leg as she tried to stop the attack,
then stabbed another neighbour, Peter
Marsden, eight times after forcing his
way into his home. Marsden survived.
At the time Arslan was on bail after
being arrested in May for harassment,
with the condition that he did not con-
tact the Boormans or Marsden. He had
also been served with a community
protection notice, a civil injunction
order and faced a final eviction hearing
in November after his landlord took
action to remove him. None of this
stopped Arslan from taking revenge.
He was first convicted of harassment
in August 2018, after being recorded on
Marsden’s doorbell camera threatening
to kill his wife.
“The only time I have felt safe in the
last 12 years are the few weeks he’s on
holiday and I know he’s not there,”
Marsden said in a witness statement. By
May 2020 Arslan was accusing Mrs
Boorman of insurance fraud after
Arslan’s wife crashed into the Boor-
mans’ parked car. After this Mrs Boor-
man said Arslan “subjected us to har-
assment, intimidation, threats and con-stant abuse”. Arslan, a Turkish citizen,
accused the Boormans of a hate crime
in December 2020 and came to their
door “threatening us in front of our
children”, Mrs Boorman said. Her hus-
band suffered a nervous breakdown.
Mrs Boorman, in a witness state-
ment, said: “He’s threatened to rape me,
he threatens to order hitmen to attack
my family. He’s threatened to murder
me and my husband several times. He
wanders around the shared driveway
late at night as if waiting for a fight.”
Multiple complaints were made to
the police from April 21-23, 2021, with
neighbours recording him in his garden
“reckoning [on] a massacre”.
Tewkesbury council served a com-
munity protection warning at Arslan’s
address on April 23, and the next day a
police officer served a notice warning
him that he had breached it with “be-
haviour that is having a detrimental ef-
fect on... local residents”. Further
complaints were made to the police
between April 26 and May 10 and
Arslan was arrested on May 11 for har-assment for filming his neighbours. He
was given bail and ordered not to con-
tact the Boormans, Marsden and Ulys-
ses Alonso, another neighbour facing
harassment.
The next day Boorman recorded Ar-
slan pretending to take a phone call in
his garden and loudly threating vio-
lence against Boorman.
Boorman made a statement on May
13 saying he feared for his andhis
family’s safety as part of a case brought
by Tewkesbury council seeking a civil
injunction for antisocial behaviour
against Arslan.
“This week he has taken images of
my daughters’ bedrooms,” Boorman
said. “I don’t know what he’s capable
of.” Boorman also emailed the letting
agent managing Arslan’s property, ask-
ing if she was serving an eviction notice
soon, adding: “We’re at breaking point.”
On May 25 Mrs Boorman, Marsden,
Alonso and the police made statements
in support of the council’s injunction
application. Mrs Boorman said: “Some-
one is going to be badly hurt very soon.”Matthew Boorman was killed despite
several pleas to the authorities for helpKiller neighbour’s three years of terror
Alonso said he had an “overriding fear
that Arslan will one day act upon his
continued threats”.
Arslan’s landlord made an applica-
tion to evict the family on June 10,
because his antisocial behaviour had
breached the terms of the tenancy.
A district judge issued a civil injunc-
tion order against Arslan on June 22
with the power of arrest if he caused a
nuisance to his neighbours or threaten-
ed them with violence. Arslan did not
attend the hearing and the next day
flew to Istanbul.
The injunction could not be served
on Arslan while he was abroad but on
September 1 an eviction hearing took
place in court, attended by Mrs Arslan.
A final eviction hearing was due to take
place after November 28.
Arslan arrived back in the UK on
September 23, was served with the in-
junction and arrested five days later
and charged with the harassment of the
Boormans and Alonso.
PC Gregory Jones spoke to Arslan by
telephone on October 4 and heard him
say: “I will murder him,” about Boor-
man. That evening Jones placed an “in-
formation marker” on Arslan’s address
in the police database, which noted the
threat to murder his neighbour.
Just after 5pm on October 5, Arslan
killed Boorman and injured Mrs Boor-
man and Marsden. Police were alerted
by a 999 call from neighbours at 5.21pm
and Arslan was arrested. He said: “He is
dead, isn’t he? I warned you, the police.
One year. Look, it happened.”
Gloucestershire constabulary has re-
ferred the case to the Independent
Office for Police Conduct and local
agencies have commissioned an inde-
pendent review of how public and pri-
vate-sector organisations addressed
the concerns of Arslan’s neighbours.
The offence of threats to kill comes
under the Offences Against the Person
Act 1861, but the offender has to intend
the recipient to believe the threat. The
problem is such threats are usually
made during heated arguments and
often fail the Crown Prosecution Ser-
vice’s evidential test.
Peter Tonge, Tewkesbury council’s
head of community services, said: “Our
powers in these complex situations are
limited, particularly when it involves
private housing. We did not have the
authority to evict him, nor the power to
instigate eviction proceedings. As with
all serious cases, we will be carrying out
a full review of our involvement.”Will Humphries
South West Correspondent
CCTV video shows that an off-duty police officer failed to deter an attack by Can Arslan, front, on the home of Peter MarsdenPA