ALBION — A registered sex offender living in a tent in the garage of a Quaker Hill Road residence for a month was discovered by a Department of Health and Human Services employee visiting a woman providing foster care for two children younger than 14 years old.
Vincent Robinson, 52, formerly of Bangor, was arrested by police Thursday in Albion on a fugitive from justice warrant and on charges of failure to comply with the sex offender registry, failure to provide a correct name and address, and two counts of prohibited contact with a person under the age of 14.
Officers were called to a Quaker Hill Road property at 9:47 p.m. after receiving a complaint that Robinson was unwanted there, according to a Friday news release from the Kennebec County Sheriff’s Office. The release said Robinson is a convicted sex offender in Maine with “several felony convictions in Maine and New Jersey that were violent/sexual in nature.”
According to an affidavit filed by Kennebec County sheriff’s Sgt. Jacob Pierce, Robinson stayed in a tent in the garage of a residence on Quaker Hill Road for a month. The woman who lives at the residence is providing care for two foster children under the age of 14.
Robinson, however, is on federal probation, and he is not allowed to have contact with children younger than the age of 18.
A DHHS employee became aware that Robinson was living on the property after meeting with the woman earlier that day. Court records say the sheriff’s office was contacted by the employee to help remove Robinson from the property.
The affidavit says a New Jersey federal probation officer told the sheriff’s office Robinson “was an extremely violent sexual predator and to use extreme caution” around him.
Pierce and a deputy met with the DHHS employee and the woman, who confirmed it was Robinson staying at the house. When Pierce and the deputy arrived at the residence, they found Robinson in the living room of the home and asked him for his name. He gave them the name “Vince B. Steves,” doing so a second time after being informed that failing to give his correct name is a crime.
Pierce then asked him if his real name was Vincent Robinson and “he lowered his head and replied ‘yes.'” When asked why he lied, “he said he didn’t want to get into trouble.”
The two children were not at home at the time of Robinson’s arrest.
Robinson told the officers, according to the affidavit, that he and the woman were not “intimate partners,” and he thought of the children as his own. He also said he was aware that he had not registered as a sex offender in Maine.
Robinson is listed as “absconded” for not complying with regular check-ins with probation officers.
He was taken to the Kennebec County Correctional Facility in Augusta. No bail is set, according to the news release.
Sam Shepherd — 621-5666
Twitter: @SamShepME
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