NORTH HAVERHILL — A Woodsville man has been arrested and charged with attempting to kidnap an 11-year-old boy at gunpoint, but the accused’s defense attorney says it is a case of mistaken identity and police apprehended the wrong man.

Keith Teele, of Woodsville, pleaded not guilty during his arraignment in Grafton County Superior Court on Monday after he was arrested on Sunday and charged with attempted kidnapping, criminal threatening and felon in possession of a dangerous weapon.

Teele allegedly attempted the abduction when the juvenile was riding his bicycle home at night, according to police.

“The Town of Haverhill is safer tonight because of (officers’) dedication to the mission of the HPD and protecting the community,” Haverhill police chief David Appleby said in a statement after Teele’s arrest on Sunday.

But according to Teele’s court-appointed attorney, an error in police work is to blame for her client being accused in the crime.

“My client maintains absolutely his innocence as to these charges and he genuinely thinks that they have gotten the wrong person,” New Hampshire state public defender Emily Wynes said during Teele’s arraignment hearing on Monday.

“Since he’s been charged with this, the fear that he’s expressing is that he’s terrified. He says he did not do this, this is not me,” Wynes told the court.

At the outset of the hearing, Grafton County Assistant Attorney Antonia Barry sought to have Teele held in preventive custody, arguing that the allegations against him showed “there’s clear and convincing evidence that Mr. Teele presents a danger to safety of the public,” and cited a prior criminal record in Massachusetts, including assault and battery with a deadly weapon.

In asking the court to release her client on bail, Teele’s defense attorney went on for several minutes and listed several examples of what she said are factual inaccuracies in the police affidavit attesting to Teele’s physical description and property. This included the color of the motor vehicle that the suspect was said to be driving when he accosted the juvenile.

Grafton County Superior Court Judge Lawrence MacLeod asked Barry if “the State wish to be heard further?”

Barry did not take the opportunity to argue further for Teele’s detention and requested only “if the court is inclined to grant the defendant’s request” for release “that he not be permitted to live at his address,” which is across the street from the victim’s residence.

MacLeod granted Teele’s release on $20,000 bond, accepting the defense’s request allowing him to reside at an address in East Ryegate, Vt., and ordering him not to leave the residence from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. and to report in person to police five times a week.

The incident that led to Teele’s arrest began last Wednesday, when the juvenile came home crying from riding his bicycle and hanging out with friends, according to a probable cause affidavit prepared by Elizabeth Elliott with the Haverhill Police Department in support of the charges. The boy said a man inside a car at the end of the street had pointed a gun at him and told him to get inside.

Scared, the boy bolted down the street to his home and the car sped off, the affidavit said.

Later that evening, when police responded to call from the mother’s male partner reporting the incident, the juvenile initially described the vehicle as a “dark color sedan” with a broken front grill. The next day, Oct. 12, the mother, the juvenile and the mother’s partner were “walking” on the street when they observed what they believed was the vehicle pull into an apartment building across from their home.

During a second interview at the police station on Friday, Oct. 13, the juvenile identified the vehicle as gray in color and repeated it had a “broken piece in front.” The juvenile also told police he often heard the car passing on the street of his family residence and “we know where it lives.” with “we” referring to him and his family and the location at the apartment building across the street, according to the affidavit.

The juvenile also said he saw a man that looked like the suspect driving in the neighborhood and get out of the car at the apartment several times. Asked to physically describe the man in the car, the boy said he was “fat,” had facial hair and a bald spot on the top of his head and wore glasses and looked like the man across the street.

During a third interview with police on Saturday, the juvenile said the man in the car pointed a gold pistol at him.

Police said their investigation showed that a description of the suspect on his driver’s license, which depicted him with facial hair and weighing 350 pounds, is consistent with the description provided by the juvenile. Police also found that the 2008 Lincoln MKZ had the front model emblem missing, matching the juvenile’s description of what police earlier had described as a “broken grill.”

But Teele’s attorney challenged several parts of the affidavit, contending that apart from the defendant’s weight and the damage to the car grill, little matches what it purports to describe.

At one point, Wynes had Teele bend the top of his head toward the camera — Teele’s was appearing via video camera from Grafton County jail next door — which showed a fully covered head of hair and no bald spot. She also pointed out that Teele’s car is green, not gray, and that he doesn’t wear glasses, “certainly not to drive.”

“He does not own a firearm, he does not even own a BB gun, he certainly does not own a ‘gold pistol,’ which is an item one would know if they owned. ... I can’t remember the last time I had a case involving a gold pistol,” Wynes volunteered.

As an indication of his self-asserted innocence, Wynes noted that her client has also cooperated “100%” with the police investigation, citing such actions as granting permission to police to search his car, his apartment and his phone (the affidavit does not cite any evidence gathered from those searches that might incriminate Teele).

Although Wynes acknowledged Teele has a criminal record she said the current charges do not match his prior offenses.

“Looking at his record I kept expecting to come across some allegation that he was a known offender against children that could have increased the chances that this was him,” she said, “But there was nothing like that.”

Contact John Lippman at jlippman@vnews.com.