Windsor — Registered sex offender Thomas Pellerin said yesterday that he has a message for his neighbors on Durkee Street and others who attended a community forum on preventing sexual assault held Wednesday night by the Windsor Police Department.

"I'm not a high-risk offender. I'm not going to re-offend," said Pellerin. "I just want to be left alone."

Pellerin, who says he is 55 (court records put his age at 56), served almost 15 years for sexually assaulting a 15-year-old girl in 1989. The girl worked for Pellerin at a video store in Bellows Falls, but the assault occurred in a car parked on a dirt road off Route 5 in Weathersfield, according to police and court records. He served the maximum time his sentence allowed because he did not participate in Vermont's sex offender treatment program and is no longer under the supervision of the Vermont Department of Corrections.

The department designated Pellerin as a "high-risk" offender because of his scores on one of two tests administered by the department that assessed his previous arrests. Pellerin's court records show he was convicted in 1973 and 1976 of attempted statutory rape and in 1990 for lewd and lascivious conduct with a minor.

At this week's forum, police and other experts did not talk specifically about Pellerin and his presence since mid-April at a boarding house off Main Street. But Windsor Police Chief Dennis Brown said at the forum that the meeting was prompted by a recent spate of phone calls to the department.

Despite that, Pellerin said he is being harassed by the police and some residents. People walking by the boarding house have yelled at him and called him a "pervert," he said. "The crime was wrong. But I did my time for it," he said. "I have rights just like anybody else does." He should have been informed of the meeting, Pellerin said.

Chief Brown said that the forum was open to all members of the public, but that Pellerin was not specifically told about it or invited to attend. The department is not trying to harass Pellerin, he said. "We're just being visible and active in the community."

Fire Chief Brian Sullivan said that having three daughters of his own he shares many of his fellow residents' concerns. However, one idea shared by the police at the forum should not be taken literally, he said. While locks on ground-level windows are a good idea in general for security purposes, nailing windows shut is dangerous because it can impede firefighters' access to the house in an emergency, Sullivan said.

Pellerin said he might have attended the forum had he known about it. He could have told people there that he did, in fact, go through a sex offender treatment program while in prison in Virginia where he served out several years of his sentence. Vermont, however, did not recognize the Virginia program, he said.

Court records from 1993 show that in 1992, Pellerin wanted to enroll in an outpatient treatment program in New Hampshire as part of his sentence, but the judge decided for reasons of "punishment, deterrence … and incapacitation" that it was not appropriate. Pellerin said yesterday that he has also volunteered to go through additional sex offender treatment now.

For some residents, that could make a difference in how they feel.

Darlene Cowdrey, who lives next to Durkee Street on Central Street, said yesterday that she did not want him in Windsor. Her seven young granddaughters frequent the Cumberland Farms across the street from Pellerin's boarding house. "It's not fair to any of the kids or women in this town to have to be afraid," she said. But, "If he had been in treatment or counseling it wouldn't have bothered me so much," she said.

For others, no matter what, the neighborhood is not an appropriate place for someone with Pellerin's history. "I just don't like what I know," said Durkee Street resident Jennifer Murphy who went to the forum. "There are too many kids in the neighborhood."

Still others said that even from the outset they were not as upset by Pellerin's presence as those who attended the meeting. "As long as he doesn't break the law or go back to his habits, he has as much right to live there as anyone else," said Jeff Creighton.