LEWISTON – Former Auburn school teacher James Raymond has pleaded not guilty to accusations that he fondled a 7-year-old student.

Raymond, 26, who lives in Auburn, was arrested in October and charged with unlawful sexual touching.

If convicted of the class D misdemeanor, he could serve up to a year in jail.

Raymond entered the plea in Lewiston’s 8th District Court on Wednesday. His case is scheduled to go to trial on April 29.

Meanwhile, Auburn police are continuing to investigate leads in Raymond’s case, said Jason Moen, Auburn’s deputy chief of police.

“This is still an active investigation,” he said.

Last fall, Raymond admitted to police that he sometimes put his hands up the skirts of young girls in his class, according to court records.

Raymond told a local police detective that he didn’t remember the incident for which he was charged, involving a pupil at Park Avenue Elementary School, where Raymond was a music teacher, Detective Chad Syphers wrote in an affidavit.

Raymond worked at Park Avenue and East Avenue elementary schools and helped run theater and band programs around the Lewiston-Auburn area.

School officials suspended Raymond immediately after the accusations were made.

The teacher resigned a few days after his arrest.

In an interview with Raymond on Oct. 24, Syphers said the teacher at first claimed any touching was accidental or innocent in nature.

But he later confided that he had an attraction to female students from kindergarten age to third grade.

He “didn’t deny having inappropriate contact” with some of them, Syphers wrote.

Raymond remains free on $5,000 cash bail.

The conditions of his release, including no contact with minors and a ban from Auburn school property and events, remain in effect, a court clerk said Thursday.