
Police are now searching for the teenager after the incident at Chatsford Retirement Village resident yesterday afternoon, Sergeant Matt Lee, of Dunedin, said.
Once confronted by the resident, the teenager fled back through the window he had used to get into the unit.
Shortly after, he was spotted jiggling the doorknob of another home in the retirement village before he ran to a nearby park.
Once there, he began verbally threatening a member of the public before again fleeing.
At 8.40pm, police were called to Forbury Rd after multiple reports of an unknown teenager walking in and out of residents' yards.
When police arrived, they found the 17-year-old in a stranger’s garden with a bag of stolen goods.
He was arrested and charged with being unlawfully in an enclosed yard, Sgt Lee said.
The teenager would appear in Dunedin Youth Court today.