PORTLANDERS are calling for the police to stop gangs terrorising the island before vigilante groups step in.

A crowd of more than 50 angry residents packed the Clifton Hotel in Grove Road amid growing fears that they no longer feel safe walking the streets.

Neil ‘Chaz’ Charlton, a Portland Town councillor and the landlord of the Clifton Hotel, told Inspector Neil Wood and PC Steve Morris at the meeting that vigilante groups will form and retaliate if the police do not deal with future incidents.

He stressed that he would not be in that group himself but knew of people who were intent on handing out their own justice.

He said: “We need more of a police presence on the island.

“There will be a vigilante group and they will be beating anybody who kicks off on the island.

“That will happen if those who kick off don’t get arrested and there’s no police presence.”

Police officers came to the meeting and promised they will be tackling anti-social behaviour while warning that anyone who takes the law into their own hands will be arrested.

But resident Nigel McColm said: “They are going to do this because they are intimidated and frightened and bullied by yobs.

Mr McColm had opened the meeting by saying: ‘everybody knows what goes on and what we have to deal with.’ He added: “We are paying good money for the police to look after us and we are not being looked after.”

Other residents told how they had been threatened on public transport and in local shops but said no action had been taken when it was reported to police Eddie Waring said he was assaulted in Easton when a group of nine young men confronted him. He said: “One of them pulled a blade on me and I just did what I had to do.”

Mr Waring said Police Community Support Officers came to his aid after the incident.

He said: “I went through the process of reporting it.

“They took statements off me.

“Lo and behold about a month later the same group smashed a greenhouse and committed an assault with a hammer.

“Why aren’t these people taken off the streets?”

Resident John Rowden said he is constantly subjected to verbal abuse He said: “Several times I’ve come back from Easton and there’s been a group of older lads in the gardens. Why should I walk around Portland feeling intimidated?”

He told police: “I don’t feel safe within my own community. What are you going to do about it?”

Mr Charlton said that residents would have another meeting in around a month’s time to see what progress had been made with police.