Investigator backs officials’ role in feud

NORRIDGEWOCK – It may be rural Maine, not the Kentucky mountains, but a five-year feud between two Norridgewock property owners sounds a lot like the tale of the Hatfields and the McCoys.

The constant bickering over where the boundary line exists between two Oak Hill Road properties has wound its way in and out of District Court, prompted more than 150 phone calls to area police and caused at least one complainant to be bodily ejected from both the Somerset County Sheriff’s Department and the District Attorney’s Office.

Most recently, one pair of the property owners involved filed six separate complaints of discrimination with the Maine Human Rights Commission, alleging that the Maine State Police, the Somerset County Sheriff’s Department and the Somerset District Attorney’s Office discriminated against them because of physical and mental disabilities.

In the complaints, Margaret and Ronald Gordon said they were discriminated against because Margaret Gordon has “learning disabilities, nerve problems and bad neck discs.” Her husband, Ronald Gordon, cited depression, diabetes, a hearing impairment and heart problems.

MHRC investigator Susan Clark recently ruled that there are no reasonable grounds substantiating the Gordons’ claims. The couple has an unlisted telephone number and could not be reached for comment.

The story of the Gordons and their neighbors on Oak Hill Road, Richard and Sharon Parks, who also have an unlisted telephone number, began five years ago when both couples disputed a shared boundary. According to the various MHRC reports, more than 15 pages of complaints from each couple have been received by various police agencies called to the property.

There have been accusations of illegal tree cutting; boundary pins have been pulled out and moved; one couple accused the other of attempting to run down their young daughter with a car; and a man operating a chain saw near the boundary line was assaulted. The reports are peppered with obscene language reportedly used by the various complainants against each other and at police.

Summonses have been served on all parties, and harassment orders currently are in effect against both neighbors. One law enforcement officer who did not want to be identified said he has responded to the disputes many times.

“Both neighbors have been told a hundred times that this dispute is civil in nature, yet they continue to want a criminal response from us,” he said. “We basically just try to settle everyone down and calm the situation. It has not been pleasant.”

The officer did not feel the situation had the potential for violence. “Basically, if one sticks his tongue out at the other, they call the police. One side is just as quick to call as the other.”

In the MHRC complaint against the Maine State Police, the Gordons maintained that there is a “history of false reports” filed against them with the MSP and that “the troopers collude with the [neighbors] in accepting their false reports.”

According to MSP records, during a six-month period in 1999 troopers were called to the Gordon home 13 times; once in March in connection with a harassment complaint, once in April (provoking a dog), three times in June (threatening, terrorizing and illegal operation of a vehicle), six times in July (telephone harassment, removal of property-line pins, verbal harassment, cutting of trees) and once in August (assault on a survey crew member.)

The reports note that the dispute over the boundary is civil in nature. All of the MHRC complaints were filed between September and November of last year.

In the complaint against the Somerset County Sheriff’s Department, the Gordons claimed discrimination after Sheriff Barry DeLong told Ronald Gordon that deputies would not respond to his complaints any longer since he had filed a complaint with the MHRC.

DeLong told MHRC investigators that since the complaint was filed, he asked the state police to respond to problems between the Gordons and their neighbors because he felt continued contact would “add fuel to the fire.” On Monday, DeLong said the constant barrage of telephone complaints continues to this day.

According to a separate MHRC complaint, when Ronald Gordon went to the District Attorney’s Office on Oct. 31, 2000, to inquire about a pending court case of harassment, he began shouting and frightening the two clerks in the office to the point that one clerk hit a “panic button” that summoned police. A warden who happened to be in the office removed Gordon from the building, said the report.

The MHRC report concluded: “Given the large number of contacts [law enforcement] has had with the Gordons over the years, some incidents were probably resolved more satisfactorily than others. Police became frustrated with the Gordons wasting their time by repeated calling about a property line dispute, when the police had already told them they could not do anything about it. The Gordons became frustrated that the police did not always see the problems the way they did.”

The complaints are set for a formal hearing later this month, but all were dismissed as unfounded by the MHRC investigator.

The officer who has responded to Oak Hill Road was not optimistic, however. “We haven’t heard the last of this, I’m sure,” he said.