May 16, 2018 - 9:12 AM
WORCESTER, Mass. - A Massachusetts man accused of going on a coast-to-coast crime rampage that started when he was charged with raping a 13-year-old girl was sentenced Tuesday to up to 12 years in prison.
Gregory Lewis, 30, of Southbridge, was sentenced after pleading guilty to more than a dozen charges, including indecent assault and battery on a child, The Telegram & Gazette reported.
Lewis had been charged with aggravated child rape, but under terms of a deal, pleaded to the lesser charges.
Prosecutors requested a sentence of 25 to 30 years.
Lewis was arrested after sexually assaulting the girl in the summer of 2014, but he cut off a court-ordered monitoring device and fled the state, authorities said.
After several days, he returned to Massachusetts and attacked his 67-year-old stepfather and stole his gun and vehicle before leaving the state again, police said.
While on the run, Lewis allegedly raped, kidnapped and robbed escorts in Colorado and Oregon, was suspected of robbing another woman working for an escort service in Indiana, and of abducting and robbing a woman in North Carolina. He was connected to crimes in Missouri and Utah and went to Kentucky, Connecticut, Kansas and Ohio while on the lam, authorities say.
He was caught in Fort Edward, New York, in October 2014 after driving into the Hudson River while fleeing a traffic stop.
He was returning to Massachusetts to kill the 13-year-old girl, investigators said at the time.
He still faces charges in at least four other states, Massachusetts authorities said.
Lewis' lawyer, Michael Cashman, requested a lighter sentence than prosecutors, saying his client had no prior criminal record as an adult and had lived a "productive and fairly normal life" before 2014.
Lewis has accepted responsibility for his conduct, his lawyer said.
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Information from: Telegram & Gazette (Worcester, Mass.), http://www.telegram.com
News from © The Associated Press, 2018