Razel M. Gavin is flanked Friday in Androscoggin County Superior Court in Auburn by his attorneys, Donald Hornblower and Michael Turndorf. Gavin charged with kidnapping, assaulting and sexually assaulting a 13-year-old girl in 2022 admitted to multiple felonies and didn’t contest a conviction for aggravated attempted murder. Christopher Williams/Sun Journal

AUBURN — A local man charged with kidnapping, assaulting and sexually assaulting a 13-year-old girl in 2022 admitted to multiple felonies and didn’t contest a conviction for aggravated attempted murder Friday.

Razel M. Gavin Androscoggin County Jail photo

Razel M. Gavin, 26, pleaded guilty in Androscoggin County Superior Court to seven crimes involving the 13-year-old girl, including kidnapping, aggravated assault, criminal threatening and four counts gross sexual assault.

Gavin entered a so-called Alford Plea to a charge of aggravated attempted murder, where he didn’t admit to the criminal conduct, but agreed that a jury could find him guilty based on the evidence prosecutors could present against him at trial.

Five of those crimes carry a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison. The latter conviction is punishable by a sentence of any number of years.

He also entered an Alford Plea for crimes including gross sexual assault, aggravated assault and unlawful sexual contact, all felonies, stemming from a 2018 case involving an 18-year-old woman with intellectual disabilities.

No date was set for sentencing, but likely will not be scheduled until next summer. No agreement has been reached on sentencing, Assistant Attorney General Kate Bozeman told Justice Jennifer Archer on Friday.

Police said Gavin kidnapped the girl near her home in the early evening of April 25, 2022, before assaulting her multiple times over six hours. Gavin was arrested in the early morning hours of the next day when Auburn Police Chief Jason Moen spotted Gavin driving a Volvo station wagon on Minot Avenue and followed him because the car fit the description of the suspicious vehicle identified in the case.

On the night of April 25, police were called to a home for a report of a missing teenager. That girl’s parents had been called by a concerned friend, Bozeman said.

The missing girl was last seen by her parents in a parking lot across the street from their home.

Surveillance video from a local business showed a dark-colored Volvo station wagon with a male operator entering the parking lot and leaving a short time later, police said.

Assisted by other law enforcement agencies, Auburn police located a car matching that description on Minot Avenue. The driver was pulled over by Chief Moen and a girl identified as the missing teen was inside with visible signs of assault.

Gavin also had a belt and a loaded firearm in his pocket, Bozeman said.

The girl told investigators she had been threatened by Gavin with a firearm, assaulted and forced into his car. She said she had been sexually assaulted in an apartment and in a wooded area over a six-hour period.

Gavin also had strangled her multiple times with his hands and with a belt and told her he was going to kill her and offered her three ways to die, including beating, strangulation or a bullet, Bozeman said.

Police said the girl didn’t know Gavin.

The girl was taken to a local hospital for treatment and reunited with her family.

In the 2018 case, Bozeman said that although the victim provided enough information that led them to Gavin as her assailant, she had felt unable to discuss the crime in detail to law enforcement or to testify, if needed, and no charges were filed at that time. When the woman saw Gavin appear on television in connection with the 2022 kidnapping and assault, she came forward and told police she was ready to talk about her assault, Bozeman said.

The victim had met Gavin on a dating app. After meeting, he drove her to his relatives’ home where he sexually assaulted her in his vehicle and in the home. He later strangled her before eventually dropping her off at a gas station.

He will remain at Androscoggin County Jail pending sentencing.