An 81-year-old pensioner has lost a seven-year, six-figure legal battle following a "ridiculous" row over a few inches of land between two houses in Ilford.
Christel Naish's dispute with her neighbour Dr Jyotibala Patel began over a garden tap and pipe allegedly trespassing on a tiny strip of "dead space" between their properties.
High Court judge Sir Anthony Mann dismissed Naish's appeal this week, saying the disputed area was "not worth arguing about" and that the case brought "litigation into disrepute" since the tap and pipe no longer posed any problems.
The conflict began after Dr Patel and her husband Vasos Vassili purchased the neighbouring property for £450,000 in 2013.
A seven-year neighbour row in Chadacre Avenue has finally come to a close
Naish, who first moved to the semi-detached house in Chadacre Avenue as a teenager with her parents, had moved back in following her father's death in 2001.
According to the couple's barrister Paul Wilmshurst, Naish repeatedly complained that their outdoor tap and pipe encroached on her land.
The "encroachment" took place on a narrow gap between the properties, created when previous owners built an extension in 1983.
The couple felt compelled to take legal action, believing they could not sell their property due to the "blight" of the unresolved dispute.
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At Mayor's and City County Court last year, a judge ruled that Dr Patel and Vassili owned the gap between the houses, determining the boundary was Naish's flank wall, rather than her guttering edge as she claimed.
The judge did, however, award Naish £1,226 in damages for damp in her conservatory, and found the couple's decking installation contributed around a fifth of the existing problem.
Naish was ordered to pay 65 per cent of her neighbours' legal costs - £100,000 - in addition to her own six-figure bills.
During the May appeal hearing, Mann told Naish's lawyers: "Hundreds of thousands of pounds about a tap and a pipe that doesn't matter."
High Court judge Sir Anthony Mann dismissed Naish's appeal this week, saying the disputed area was 'not worth arguing about'
PA"You don't care about the pipe and the tap, so why does it matter, for goodness' sake, where the boundary lies? It seems to me to be a ridiculous piece of litigation - on both sides, no doubt."
The appeal process alone added more than £30,000 to the case's total cost.
The judge rejected Naish's appeal and her challenge regarding the damp damages, while a decision on her neighbours' costs appeal is pending.
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