MEXICO – A Lewiston man who gained national attention last week after jumping from a third-floor balcony in an attempt to elude police was arrested late Thursday night after barricading himself in a Mexico home and keeping authorities at bay for hours.

 Norman “Bo” Thompson, 35, will be arraigned today in Oxford County Superior Court at 10:30 a.m. on at least three new charges including burglary, theft and being in violation of bail conditions.

The saga involving Thompson began Thursday morning and was punctuated by intermittent flash-bang grenades and what sounded like multiple gunshot volleys as police attempted to flush him out of the home.

Thompson was taken into custody at about 11:30 p.m. Family members said he had threatened suicide, but Mexico police Chief Jim Theriault said late Thursday that Thompson was apprehended unharmed. “He is not injured, and everybody is safe and he is on his way to Oxford County Jail,” he said.

Theriault said State Police tactical team members found Thompson in the basement of the Oxford Street home, which is owned by his mother. “They searched the whole house and found him in the last little nook that they looked at,” he said.

When asked if Thompson would soon be free on bail, the chief said, “Don’t ask me, that’s a question for the district attorney.”

Prosecutors were criticized by several law-enforcement agencies last week when Thompson was released from jail without having to post bail. Police have chased after Thompson before, and caught him, only to see him released with minimal bail posted. He’s a suspect in a variety of thefts in the region and has an extensive criminal record.

Theriault said the ordeal Thursday began when a neighbor called authorities in the morning to say they saw Thompson appearing to break in through the second-story window of the home. Police in the town had been looking for Thompson for the last three days in connection with three car thefts and five car burglaries, Theriault said.

“We were looking for him because we have probable cause that he committed a (felony) burglary,” Theriault said.

Tear gas had been fired into the building at least twice, but police were not certain if it reached Thompson. The two-story building has both an attic and a cellar, Theriault said. “It’s a pretty big building,” he said.

Thompson gained widespread attention last week when a Sun Journal photographer captured dramatic photos of him leaping from a third-floor porch in Lewiston while running from police. The photographer, Russ Dillingham, tackled Thompson and held him until police could handcuff him.

Authorities on Thursday attempted to contact Thompson by phone and were also speaking to him using a bullhorn. But he was refusing to answer, Theriault said. He and many of the other officers on the scene had been there for more than 14 hours.

Chad Oliver of Rumford, who stood in a driveway on Granite Street a few houses away from the house, said the standoff began between 9 and 9:30 a.m.

A woman who said she lives at 121 Granite St. said that Thompson was standing outside the home when two police cars drove up between 9:30 and 10 a.m.

“As soon as he saw the two cops in front of the house, he ran up the stairs and into the house,” she said, declining to identify herself.

Then, when she stepped outside to smoke a cigarette at 10:30 a.m., she said the streets were blocked by police cars and could see more cruisers arriving. Shortly after, Thompson’s mother, Sharron Fuller drove to the scene, where she was interviewed by two state troopers. She told the officers that her son had no guns in the house, but police were skeptical.

Theriault said police had received numerous reports that Thompson previously had been seen with a .45-caliber handgun, but police had not seen any weapon Thursday.

Thompson’s family said they feared he may attempt suicide.

“He called me this morning and said he was sorry and said goodbye and said he was going to hang himself,” Thompson’s older brother, Allen Thompson, said.

“A month ago he told me he was going to hang himself,” Fuller said earlier in the day. “Why are they standing around doing nothing?”

By 11 a.m., Oxford County sheriff’s Detective Lt. Hart Daley and Rumford Detective Sgt. Daniel Garbarini, armed with rifles, stood behind a home on Brook Lane. Garbarini occasionally put binoculars to his eyes and trained them on the side of Fuller’s home.

People standing in the driveway at 121 Granite St. said they often saw Thompson peer out the window. From 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., tactical team members dressed in camouflage and body armor climbed through woods onto Granite Street and took positions on both sides of the street.

“He stole my car,” Heidi Briggs of 74 Swett Ave., Mexico, said after walking up to stand with the crowd. When people turned to look at her, she said that Thompson had stolen her white Dodge Intrepid from her driveway between 10 p.m. and midnight on Tuesday.

“They got him on surveillance gassing up in Livermore,” Briggs said. Her account could not be confirmed by police late Thursday.

Thirty minutes later, Daley and Garbarini moved behind a teal Jeep blocking Granite Street and told the gathering crowd to move 100 yards away from the scene.

An armored vehicle drove up Oxford Street at 1:41 p.m. and parked diagonal to the Fuller house. The crowd was pushed back farther.

As Allen Thompson talked to the media, he grew increasingly emotional about the situation.

“He’s at his mother’s house. That’s where he runs when he’s afraid,” he said. “He’s a paranoid schizophrenic. He’s bipolar … he doesn’t want to go back to prison, because he said he was raped in prison. All they do is take this kid, lock him up, and throw him back on the street.”

The Thompson family was upset last week when the court released him without bail after his arrest on an outstanding warrant, wishing instead that he’d been ordered to remain in jail, where he could receive treatment.

“He’s retarded, he is mentally retarded and he is high on crack,” Allen Thompson said.

At 3:30 p.m., a State Police negotiator began talking into a megaphone from behind the armored car. At 3:45 p.m., a tactical team member stepped out from behind the car and lobbed a flash-bang grenade, which exploded loudly over the street opposite the Fuller house.

The negotiator continued to tell Thompson to come out of the house with his hands in the air, without a gun and give himself up.

At 4:03 p.m., tactical team members began lobbing tear gas canisters at the house. At 5:27 p.m., several gunshots could be heard, shots that a former Mexico police officer said were mace-like chemicals being fired into the house.

“We’re not firing at you. We’re not trying to harm you,” the man on the megaphone said. “We’re trying to get your attention. Come out of the house with your hands up. Nobody’s out here to harm you, Bo.”

By about 6 p.m., as darkness and drizzle settled in, police were asking Thompson to give them a sign that he was OK. The armored car drove back down Oxford Avenue. Then, at 6:45 p.m., several flash-bang grenades were set off along with several noises that sounded like gunshots that came from all sides of the house.

Allen Thompson said he didn’t believe his brother presented a threat to police, as both of his ankles were injured when he jumped from the Lewiston porch last week while trying to escape police there.

Staff editors Scott Thistle and Judy Meyer contributed to this report.