Woman, 91, Receives $148 Fine For Noisy Rocking Chair


In a case of going from the sublime to the ridiculous, a 91-year-old woman in Saguenay, Quebec, received a ticket for disturbing the peace… due to her “annoyingly” noisy rocking chair.

Someone is obviously a tad too sensitive to noise, as on April 17 the neighbor apparently complained to the Saguenay police that Yvette Vachon’s chair was just making too much of a racket.

According to Vachon’s lawyer, the Saguenay police then totally overreacted by fining the poor woman $148 for disturbance of the peace, due to her noisy rocking chair.

The NY Daily News reports that the neighbor lives downstairs from the elderly lady and filed a police complaint about the noisy rocking chair.

According to CTV News, the excessive noise bylaw Vachon was said to have violated normally applies to anyone “shouting, swearing or behaving in a way to annoy the neighbors or passersby.” Vachon’s lawyer says a noisy rocking chair probably doesn’t come near to that status.

Attorney Charles Cantin said that the officers responded by giving her the highly-priced ticket. According to Cantin, the police officers’ handling of the situation was “embarrassing” and that they used unnecessary intimidation against the elderly woman.

“I don’t think it’s a good way to settle that matter.”

However, Saguenay police spokesman, Bruno Cormier, stood by their decision saying the complainant had insisted officers take action against the 91-year-old woman.

Once the story went public and said public were outraged over the incident, police apparently looked further into the case and were investigating if a warning should have been issued rather than the hefty ticket.

Saguenay police have now issued a statement saying that after reviewing the situation they have decided to cancel the ticket against Vachon.

Vachon told the Canadian media that ever since the whole thing started, she was troubled by what was going to happen “because of all that foolishness.”

Vachon had apparently been sitting in her La-Z-Boy-style rocking chair enjoying watching a little television and apparently the noise happened when she used her feet to close the chair.

Now she’s happy the matter has been resolved.

“I feel very good because I can now sleep and get some rest.”

“Before, I was unhappy and now I am happy.”

In other news of elderly folk, the Inquistr recently reported that a lonely old man left his entire fortune to a builder who cleaned his gutters for free. This apparently has made his relatives absolutely furious.

[Image: CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 Jennifer Riefenberg]

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