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Ogden • An Ogden man accused of kidnapping and sexually abusing a 14-year-old boy last summer will not hear the evidence in the case against him — so long as plea negotiations in the case continue.
Ryan Mitchell Schaffer, 34, is charged in 2nd District Court with four first-degree felonies — one charge of aggravated kidnapping and three charges of forcible sodomy.
He is accused of kidnapping the teen from an Ogden train station and forcing the boy to commit sexual acts with him over several days in July.
A pre-trial conference is scheduled Nov. 3 before Judge Mark DeCaria.
If plea negotiations break down, Schaffer can reinstate his right to a preliminary hearing, where prosecutors show there is probable cause that the charged crimes were committed.
"When a defendant waives a preliminary hearing it's often for tactical reasons," DeCaria explained to the court Tuesday morning. "Sometimes, those tactical reasons are not known."
In May, DeCaria refused to accept a plea agreement, saying the proposed deal was "quite a change" from the initial charges, and that he was "not convinced that all necessary details have been resolved."
Police say Schaffer approached the teen at a FrontRunner station on July 3 and threatened him with a knife. Schaffer allegedly took the boy all over Ogden over the next three days and forced the boy to have sex, sometimes at gunpoint.
He fled Utah after the alleged crime and was eventually arrested in California and had to be extradited back to Ogden.
Schaffer is a registered sex offender in Utah, stemming from a 2007 case in Salt Lake County in which he pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree felony exploitation of a minor.
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