Owner raffles her vandal-hit home

The three-bedroomed home will be raffled on 1 November

A woman is raffling her County Durham home after suffering a three-year campaign of vandalism by rowdy youths.

Mercedes de Dunewic, who lives in West Cornforth, in Tony Blair's Sedgefield constituency, said she has reported 180 incidents in the past three years.

Tickets for the three-bedroom, detached house, complete with top security systems, are on sale for £1,000.

Durham Police said officers had caught and prosecuted a number of offenders and patrols have been stepped up.

Ms de Dunewic needs to sell between 200 and 250 tickets to constitute a legal draw and the monies are being held in trust by a bank ahead of picking the winning number, planned for 1 November.

I will never buy a house again. I will always rent because...you can easily move on Mercedes de Dunewic

She said the first time her home was targeted was within a week of moving into her High Street home three years ago when the windows were smashed.

Since then she said she has had fireworks pushed through the letterbox and graffiti scrawled on walls and doors.

"I've decided to raffle my house because I can't sell it with 180 crimes logged against it for what it's worth, because nobody wants to live in a house that's had 180 crimes," Ms de Dunewic said.

"I can't let it, unless I let it to people who don't mind putting up with trouble, and I can't leave it empty, so my attitude is to raffle the house and it's a good bargain for what it is."

She has completely refurbished the house while she has been there and believes she has been targeted for taking a stand against yobbish behaviour.

Electronic tagging

Insp Adrian Green of Durham Police said: "It is a very small minority of youths within West Cornforth who are using anti-social behaviour to intimidate people and obviously that makes people who may well be witnesses reticent to come forward.

"We have caught and prosecuted a number of people, we have used curfews, electronic tagging and custodial sentences to tackle the incidents."

Ms de Dunewic said she has "no idea" where she will move to, but it will be outside the region.

"I will never buy a house again. I will always rent because then if something happens you can easily move on," she said.