A MAN who subjected his neighbour to "untold harassment", including installing a mock tombstone in his garden bearing his name, has narrowly avoided jail.

Deacon Phelan, 49, appeared for sentence at Bradford and Keighley Magistrates' Court today after previously pleading guilty to a charge of harassment without violence committed against his neighbour Paul Hartnett while they were neighbours in Thomas Street, Haworth.

The court heard that Phelan had also put up crucifixes in his yard with messages referring Mr Hartnett, alongside posters on his windows, door, and motorbike.

He also admitted playing loud music, shouting abuse while sitting on top of his shed wearing a balaclava mask, and using full-length mirrors to deliberately reflect sunlight into his victim's home.

Prosecutor Nusrat Mahmood said the offences took place between the beginning of October 2014 and October 9 last year, after Mr Hartnett had reported Phelan to Bradford Council for burning items in his garden and complained about smoke coming from his chimney.

Miss Mahmood said Mr Hartnett had returned from a three-month holiday to find a tombstone on the back of Phelan's door with his name on and the letters 'RIP'.

Another sign put on display read "So the abused becomes the abuser", understood to have related to a newspaper article featuring Mr Hartnett, in which he mentioned how he suffered attempted sexual molestation by Catholic priests while at school.

Another handwritten sign on a flip chart situated at Phelan's back door read "Paul Hartnett, gone but not forgotten. RIP", and the court heard he had also put up a white wooden cross with a dummy mounted on top, again displaying the letters 'RIP'.

In his victim statement to police, Mr Hartnett, who is gay, described the harassment as a "deliberate and sadistic hate crime", a claim rejected by Phelan's solicitor, John Bottomley.

Reading the statement to the court, Miss Mahmood said Mr Hartnett had suffered flashbacks and a fear of being under attack in his own home.

She said he had suffered "physical, emotional, mental, and financial effects on his character", and had been forced to attend hospital due to the stress caused by the incidents.

She added that Mr Hartnett had been forced to spend around £15,000 to get away from Haworth for at least three months, with the harassment "effectively driving him out of his own home".

Mr Bottomley, for Phelan, most of the signs put up by his client were so small they could not be seen by the naked eye, unless Mr Hartnett had been "looking for them".

He also told the court that Phelan, who has since moved to Westroyd, in Hipperholme, Halifax, had "demonstrated his willingness to end the dispute" by selling his home on December 8 last year, accepting a cash offer of £43,000 from a home-buying company, said to be well below its estimated market value of £85,000.

Chairman of the bench Philip Turner sentenced Phelan to 18 weeks in prison, suspended for a year, with a ten-day rehabilitation activity requirement.

He was also given a six-week electronic curfew from 7pm to 7am, ordered to pay £1,000 in compensation to his victim, and handed a restraining order preventing him from contacting Mr Hartnett or going within 100 metres of his property.

Mr Turner told Phelan: "This was a catalogue of behaviour that was not acceptable.

"You caused this gentleman untold harassment, and you are very lucky you are not going to prison today.

"You need to reflect on what you've done and not do this to anyone else."