Yearlong Concord Police Investigation Leads To Statutory Rape Charges

CONCORD, NH — A teen from Concord is facing two felonious sexual assault charges accused of statutory rape in the summer of 2022.

Grant Boyd Gentzel, now 19, of Stone Street in Concord, was arrested on two felony felonious sexual assault counts on Nov. 6, 2023, as well as a possession-use of a tobacco product by a minor.

The investigation into the allegations started the year before, in late November 2022, when a local parent met with police to speak with an officer about some information they had obtained that they wanted to share with the officer, knowing the officer was working on other cases. The girl reportedly told the parent she was sexually involved with Gentzel when she was 13, according to an affidavit.

The officer noted she was “familiar with Grant” due to other cases she was working on.

The girl accused Gentzel of providing her with marijuana during the summer of 2022. When they were high, she said, Gentzel would initiate sexual activity, the affidavit said. The officer said they had requested a consent search form for the girl’s cellphone and found notes, lists, and thoughts the girl had written, the report said, including about Gentzel and other boys, who were all believed to be under 18, the report said.

The officer discovered interaction between Gentzel and the girl later than the summer, the report said, something the girl “did not acknowledge” during their initial conversation.

A search warrant was requested in December 2022 from Verizon Wireless. According to an affidavit, the officer eyed an exchange between Gentzel and the girl in July 2022. The affidavit said the officer also eyed a file of Snapchat screenshots that appeared to be a conversation between Gentzel and another juvenile girl.

In another section of the girl’s phone, the officer found notes where the girl spoke about being upset with two other girls.

“After reviewing the locked note files,” the officer wrote, “it is believed that for a period of time over the summer of 2022, (the girl) and Grant were engaging in a relationship.”

The girl was interviewed at the Merrimack County Advocacy Center in mid-December 2022, and she spoke about activities with Gentzel, that the activities occurred in Rollins Park, Memorial Field, and another park, the name of which she could not recall, and smoking marijuana, the affidavit stated.

The report said a detective was brought in to speak to Gentzel in June 2023.

Gentzel confirmed his cell phone number and said he was homeless most of the summer, often sleeping in the gazebo at Rollins Park, an affidavit said. When asked about the girl, he said she was one of the “Rundlett kids” who would “come and bother him,” the report said. Gentzel claimed the girl lied about her age, saying she was 15 years old, but he knew she was 13 or 14, the report said. Gentzel also denied having sexual relations with the girl, according to the affidavit, but said he was crashing in her garage when he first was kicked out of his parent’s house.

The detective showed Gentzel a screenshot of a text message exchange from September 2022, and he said he was “highly under the influence” during that time period and also lost his phone in Plymouth for about a week, the report said. Gentzel was accused of blaming a friend for having the phone, then said he did not know the friend, “and then quickly said he wasn’t really a friend.” When asked about the Snapchat exchange, he said he unfortunately recognized it, the report said.

“Grant admitted that he overstepped his boundaries in the conversation and that the stuff he said wasn’t the best,” the office wrote. “Grant said the conversation started out as him just wanting ‘them’ to know they were cared about.”

When asked whether he had sex with the two girls when he was under the influence, “Grant responded with, ‘I guess, but highly doubtful,’” adding it was difficult to get an erection while doing heroin, the affidavit stated.

In late May 2023, an officer requested a search warrant for Gentzel’s cell phone after he refused to provide his password, a report stated. It was approved, and data from Apple and iCloud was delivered to police in mid-August 2023.

One conversation between Gentzel and another adult in mid-July 2022 raised the issue of the age difference between him and a girl. Gentzel said he found it funny the adult was appalled with a two-and-half-year difference. The adult responded, “It’d be different if she was 18 and you were 22, but there’s (sic) laws, never mind maturity that takes place during those years. There’s a huge difference. I know you don’t think so but you’re wrong.”

The officer noted in the report that in mid-July 2022, Gentzel was 18 and the girl was 13, an age difference of five years, not two-and-half.

The officer requested a warrant for Gentzel’s arrest on Nov. 1, 2023, and he was charged five days later.

Gentzel was indicted on the charges earlier this month and had a dispositional conference hearing in Merrimack County Superior Court on Tuesday. The defense attorney requested to seal filings in the case. He returns to superior court on May 8 for another dispositional conference hearing.

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