As of Wednesday afternoon convicted kidnapper Norman Dickinson is still living at Pine Point in Scarborough although the Department of Corrections is working to move him to another location.

Dickinson has been staying at a King Street cottage for about two weeks now and residents have been vocally opposed to him living in their neighborhood, including gathering in a group outside his home to yell at him.

Scarborough Police Chief Robert Moulton said the Corrections Department is looking at three options for a future home, none of which are in Scarborough. One place is available immediately, the other will be available in a week and the third will be ready on Dec. 1.

During a community meeting last week at the Pine Point fire station, Moulton told residents that harassing Dickinson will not make the situation any better.

“This is not the time where a lynch mob mentality will be helpful,” Moulton said. “I don’t think threatening folks or causing issues is going to be helpful to this situation at all.”

Moulton was referring to an incident last week when a group of people went to Dickinson’s cottage and yelled at him outside of his home. Dickinson in turn contacted police. When an officer arrived no one was to be found.

Other than that there have been no problems surrounding Dickinson’s presence on Pine Point, Moulton said. Mouton stressed that Dickinson is not walking around alone and is supervised whenever he leaves the cottage.

Until Dickinson moves, the Scarborough Police Department and Volunteers In Police Service will monitor his cottage to ensure no problems arise. VIPS are a volunteer group assisting the police department and will keep an eye on the area. If a problem does arise group members will notify the police.

“For his benefit and neighbors I thought it would be helpful to have some kind of presence down there,” Moulton said.

At this point the volunteers have been used randomly and have been working primarily during the evening, but have been at the site during the day on at least one occasion. Volunteers had been sitting close to Dickinson’s cottage, but he called police and said he was feeling harassed.

Although Scarborough is paying close attention to Dickinson, the Department of Corrections does not feel that Dickinson poses an extreme danger to the community.

“He does not pose the risk that people believe he poses,” said Lisa Nash, assistant regional correctional administrator Thursday night. “We absolutely do not feel this is any where near the most dangerous guy we have supervised, are supervising or will supervise in the future.”

Nash said that in 1989, when Dickinson was 20 years old, he was convicted of kidnapping. He was never charged with or convicted of any sex crime and his probation violations were all “technical violations” that involved no further criminal offense, she said.

According to South Portland Detective Reed Barker, who worked on Dickinson’s case, on Feb. 2, 1989, Dickinson undertook a handful of criminal acts in South Portland and was quickly apprehended in Portland. All of the incidents involved a toy gun.

Barker said Dickinson first approached a woman at Atlantic Place, an office park off Foden Road, pointed the gun at her and order her into her car. The woman screamed and Dickinson walked away toward the Corner Brook shopping area at the corner of Foden Road and Western Avenue.

Dickinson then forced another woman who was getting out of her car to get back in and, while he was in the back seat, ordered her to drive to Cummings Road. He told her to stop on Cummings Road, near what is now the Target shopping center, at which point Dickinson got out of the car, and the woman drove away and called the police.

Dickinson then walked over to the parking lot of the Jackson Institute – later the Spring Harbor Hospital and now being renovated – and attempted to carjack another woman. The woman refused to go and offered him her keys. Dickinson took her money and drove off in her vehicle. Shortly thereafter he was caught in Portland, having crashed the car.

The Corrections Department is working to provide Dickinson with the necessary assistance to ensure that he will be able to live a regular life once his probation expires in four years, Nash said. If Dickinson is sent back to prison, he will be released in four years without any supervision and this is the best opportunity to try to effect some change, she said.

Nash said Dickinson is in better mental condition compared to eight years ago when he wrote to a judge calling himself a “time bomb.”

Dickinson is monitored by a GPS ankle bracelet what will remain on for the “foreseeable future,” Nash said, adding that it will be at least six months to a year before he would even have a chance to remove it.

The bracelet notifies the probation officers whenever he goes outside of a specific perimeter. Officials declined to provide the exact area for the zone due to security reasons, but said it does allow him to walk outside in a small area close to his house.

It was announced at the meeting at Dickinson will be leaving Pine Point in the near future. That led residents to ask what can be done so others like him cannot move into the area.

Moulton said the police department does not have the right to determine where Dickinson or anyone else can or cannot live in Scarborough.

“He has a right to live where he can live,” he said. “If a landlord chooses to rent to someone I can’t stop a landlord from doing that.”

The only organization that can decide where former convicts reside is the Corrections Department, and then only if the individual is on probation.

“It really doesn’t involve us at all,” Moulton said.

Residents also were upset that police did not notify them about Dickinson’s presence. However, Moulton said Dickinson is not a sex offender and it is not clear if police can notify neighbors of the presence of someone convicted of his offenses, like they do with sex offenders.

If they can notify residents, that leads to the question of what offenses do police choose to notify residents about and what offenses do they choose to ignore, he said.

“I think I need to reserve the right for those folks we really think are a danger,” Moulton said.

Scarborough Police Chief Robert Moulton gestures as he talks to Pine Point residents Thursday about convicted kidnapper Norman Dickinson, who is living in the neighborhood.