1- Yeah, returning it seems like the only way, I don't know whether to just wait until she asks though. It's suspicious to me that Jenny's sister seemed so set on getting it back and then just dropped it and never contacted me as to when she would be free to come and collect it, it has me thinking that Jenny has told her it's not worth the money she owes, there was no SD card in the camera either, so no photos to get back. It's really important for us to get the keys back, I've had an attempted threat from one of her new house mates, a few prank phone calls. They have all been blocked. Our main worry is that she or even just her new friends will seek retribution for her and try and come into our house, I've made sure one of us is in at all times. I did see this new housemate walking on our street too, she was looking at our house.
2- Yes that's true about the rent. Truly, we wanted her out of the house more than we cared about paying for her share. We've been dealing with it, sometimes it's been late but we've always come through in a matter of weeks and we are on top of it. One thing we will refuse to pay for is any repairs that need taking care of in her room. Jenny smoked in there every day even though we all agreed we wouldn't do that when we first moved in. The ceiling is wrecked also. I sent the landlord photo's of the room after she moved out and also of the ash trays she had in there whilst she lived there, as evidence. Since we are all liable, if we all refuse then there is nothing to do but to seek her out as she is still on the agreement with the rest of us.
3- I told the landlord on the day she moved, but she never gave him notification beforehand, or us for that matter. I cleaned the room after I sent the pictures to the landlord but the bed slats, carpet, and ceiling, cannot be fixed.
Yes I guess it is more of a civil dispute actually, we thought so. Jenny's sister threatened to get her father-in-law, who is apparently a high ranking officer, to come to our house and get it. I said there was no need. When my other housemate emailed the sister, after she was calling me a liar and getting angry, Jenny's sister emailed and told me she would file a harassment case against her, and to not give out her email (I actually got the sister's email from the tenancy agreement, she was Jenny's mum's witness, my housemate got it the same way).
Another thing is, we found out Jenny used a fake witness on the Tenancy agreement, which is against the law. I told the landlord about that but he didn't really respond to it, he just told me to clean the room and be done with it. It was pretty obvious, she used a friends name, who moved back home last year. She used his email and phone number but then just put his address down as "Sheffield", how stupid. Although, this is a girl who put down "Has experience with packing poppadoms" on a CV, No joke.
Overall, we've just accepted how things are, and will probably just live with the fact that we will never get the money or keys back from her, she's too stubborn, she always has been.