I disagree with 99% of the comments on here. If her neighbor actually took time and MONEY out of their life and made such a strenuous effort to keep her son out of their yard, don't you think there's a DAMN good reason?? How do you know the kid wasn't ripping out her garden? How do you know he wasn't tormenting a dog who was chained up? Someone gets an electric fence to keep a kid off their lawn, there's a damn good reason for it. And how is this an FML? Didn't come out of your wallet and it doesn't affect your house or lawn. Your poor neighbor! Guarantee that there's a whole story (or multiple stories) behind this. Control your child, it's no one else's responsibility.

He'll end up having to take it down for safety reasons. You can't just put electric fences but please watch your kid because that's an extreme reaction.

I wish I could do that to keep the teenagers off my doorstep. They always hang out during school hours and drop trash and spit, leave food scraps and cigarette butts everywhere and commit vandalism. Even my landlord stuck up for me by complaining to the school board but nothing has been done. IHML (I Hate My Life)

Why should it matter? Supervise the kid like you are supposed to and nothing bad will happen. If you are too much of a puss to tell the kid "no", then the fence will do it for you.

Hopefully this opens the OP's eyes that the world isn't his/her son's personal playground.

Guess that's a sign you should probably do the responsible thing and monitor your child's outdoor whereabouts and activities. At least he's doing it to keep someone out rather than to keep someone in... or so we hear.

It did not work in Jurassic Park. What makes them think it will work on a five year old?

I would do the same. You need to control your kid.

I'm guessing there's a reason they went to such great lengths.

You are the parent. Why do you not control your child.