Accused rapist with Braintree record indicted

http://www.wickedlocal.com/braintree/news/x2072224411/Accused-rapist-with-Braintree-record-indicted

Accused rapist with Braintree record indicted

By Robert Aicardi
GateHouse News Service
Posted Nov 28, 2009
Braintree —

A convicted sex offender who served time in jail for following a woman into a bathroom at the Borders bookstore in Braintree last year has been indicted for allegedly trying to rape a woman inside a bathroom at Massachusetts General Hospital in October.
David C. Flavell, 40, a former Brockton resident now listed as homeless in Boston, is being held without bail until a Dec. 4 dangerousness hearing.
This hearing could result in Flavell being held for 90 days without bail, said Jake Wark, spokesman for the Suffolk County District Attorney’s office.
In addition to charges of assault with intent to rape, a Suffolk County grand jury indicted Flavell on Nov. 23 on two counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and one count of assault and battery.
Prosecutors allege that on Oct. 22, Flavell dragged a 27-year-old woman into a hospital bathroom, choked her, and put his knee on her chest before he tore at the front of her pants, ripping off both buttons and pulling down the zipper.
Flavell was arraigned on Nov. 24.
Flavell, who recently underwent a 20-day psychiatric evaluation at Bridgewater State Hospital, is competent to face the charges against him, a Boston Municipal Court judge ruled on Nov. 16.
According to the Massachusetts Sex Offender Registry, Flavell is classified as a Level 3 sex offender, the category for those considered most likely to re-offend.
Flavell’s criminal record includes convictions on a charge of assault with intent to rape and three counts of open and gross lewdness between 1998 and 2001.
Bristol County prosecutors tried to have Flavell held as a sexually dangerous person in 2005, but he was released from a Bridgewater prison treatment center for sex offenders in February, 2006 after Superior Court Judge Richard Moses determined that he was not sexually dangerous.
On Jan. 29, 2008, Braintree police arrested Flavell, who allegedly peered under a ladies’ room stall at the Borders bookstore on Grossman Drive, startling a 36-year-old Holbrook woman.
“We consider his actions extremely serious and Flavell to be a very dangerous individual,” Deputy Police Chief Russell Jenkins said at the time.
Borders employees told Officer Michael Want that the woman, who left the store and later returned to speak with Want, was in a stall in the ladies’ room around 8 p.m. when a man stuck his head into her stall from underneath the separating wall, said nothing, and fled the area.
A witness who saw the man in the area of the ladies’ room described him as wearing dark clothing, possibly a running suit, and carrying a black bag.
An employee described it as a black Adidas bag with white stripes and went on to say that the man spent two hours on the pay phone near the café, located close to the restrooms.
Surveillance video showed the man to be light skinned with a short Afro and possible facial hair. He was of medium build and was wearing a black puffy coat, a dark colored Adidas sweatshirt, and tan or light brown pants
After officers viewed surveillance video provided by the bookstore, Detective Brendan McLaughlin believed that the suspect bore a resemblance to an individual he had investigated for making obscene phone calls to a Connecticut Child Protective Services hotline in 2006.
In that incident, Flavell allegedly made numerous phone calls to the hotline from pay phones in Boston and Braintree, including payphones outside the post office on Pearl Street and the Sports Authority, which is located across from Borders.
While working a traffic detail at the intersection of Union Street and Grossman Drive, McLaughlin observed Flavell entering the Sports Authority/Borders bookstore area on several occasions.
In the Borders investigation, both witnesses were shown an array containing several photographs, including Flavell’s, and narrowed their selection down to two photos of Flavell and another person.
According to Jenkins, the victim viewed the same photo array on Feb. 19, 2008 and positively identified Flavell as the person who stuck his head into her stall.
On that same day, a Brockton woman called McLaughlin, informed him that she viewed the photograph posted on Mass Most Wanted, and identified the individual as Flavell.
An arrest warrant was issued that afternoon, charging Flavell with annoying or accosting a person of the opposite sex as well as disorderly conduct, both misdemeanors.
McLaughlin and Detective Mark Sherrick, assisted by Brockton police, arrested Flavell that night at a donut shop in Brockton.
At the time of his arrest, police said, Flavell was carrying the same backpack that he reportedly had on the night of the Borders incident, and inside it were three pairs of work gloves, a black ski mask, and a roll of duct tape.
Flavell was held at the Braintree police station pending his Feb. 20, 2008 arraignment in Quincy District Court, where he pleaded innocent and was ordered held on $10,000 cash bail.
Flavell admitted on April 22, 2008 in Quincy District Court that there were sufficient facts to find him guilty.
Judge Mary Dacey White sentenced Flavell to six months in jail with credit for 63 days served because he had been unable to come up with bail.
Earlier this year, Norfolk County District Attorney William Keating tried to get Flavell declared a sexually dangerous person, but Judge Janet Sanders denied the request, ruling that Flavell didn’t meet the standard.
Material from GateHouse News Service and the Associated Press was used in this story.