YOUNGSTOWN — The attorney for Austintown Trustee and former Poland schools resource officer Steve Kent filed a change of venue motion with Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, alleging media exposure would taint a jury pool.

Kent is accused of sexual battery in connection with an inappropriate relationship he allegedly had with a Poland Seminary High School student during his time as the school’s resource officer. His trial is scheduled for Aug. 7 in the courtroom of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court Judge John Durkin.

Attorney John Juhasz’s filing compares his client’s case to that of Sam Sheppard, the Ohio surgeon convicted of killing his wife in 1954, and exonerated by the United States Supreme Court in 1966 on the basis that his trial failed to meet the standards of the due process clause of the 14th Amendment.

“The constitutional presumption of innocence may be overcome by proper proof, but it may not be impermissibly undermined,” Juhasz wrote. “The trial jury must determine whether the government has proved its case beyond a reasonable doubt based only upon the evidence provided to jurors in the courtroom, and not based on the surrounding environs or anything else.”

While jurors might be prohibited from viewing news related to a case during trial and deliberations, Juhasz asserts that any prospective jurors in Mahoning County might already have been corrupted well before receiving a jury summons related to Kent’s case. He says news coverage since his client’s arrest is to blame.

In addition to citing news articles that outline the charges and specific allegations against Kent, the motion states that comments connected to those articles, on websites and on social media, are equally prejudicial to anyone who might be empaneled on Kent’s jury. Juhasz specifically mentions political actions that residents have already taken against Kent as evidence of bias, including a “drive-through” petition signing to remove him from his position as a trustee.

Besides Sheppard’s, the motion cites several cases in which defendants either were granted a change of venue or later had their convictions overturned because of jury or community bias against them, believed to be influenced by pretrial media coverage.