YOUNGSTOWN — A former police officer accused of an inappropriate relationship with a high school student will have to begin his prison sentence after a state court rejected his appeal Monday.

Steve Kent, 55, of Canfield, was convicted of tampering with evidence last year in a trial that also saw him charged with three counts of sexual battery. The jury acquitted him on the sexual battery charges but found that Kent destroyed evidence by performing a factory reset on his phone within a day of learning that a parent was going to report him to Poland Local Schools officials and Poland Township Police, where he worked.

Kent was the school resource officer at Poland Seminary High School. He was accused of forcing a student to perform oral sex on three occasions in 2021.

The girl confided in a parent — who happened to be having an affair with Kent at the time — and the woman confronted Kent on June 5, 2021, letting him know that she was reporting him the next day.

Data on Kent’s phone showed he performed a factory reset at 12:54 p.m. June 6. Kent was convicted Aug. 14, 2023, and one day later was ousted as an Austintown Township trustee. Mahoning County Prosecutor Gina DeGenova notified the board that Kent’s felony conviction rendered him incompetent to serve as a township official.

Former township administrator Mike Dockry filled in until Bruce Shepas was elected to the seat last November.

Kent appealed his conviction in late September and asked county Common Pleas Court Judge John M. Durkin to stay his sentence while he appealed. Durkin denied the motion, but the Seventh District Court of Appeals in Youngstown overruled him Oct. 3, ordering Kent released from jail. He has been free since then, but will report this morning to Mahoning County Jail to serve the one-year term.

In the appeal ruling, Judges Cheryl Waite, Mark Hanni and Katelyn Dickey wrote that “the appellant sent the victim’s cellphone many texts, images and videos from his cellphone. The data on the appellant’s phone would have been valuable as evidence against him regarding the assault charges. The timing of the erasure of evidence, as well as his knowledge as a police officer that an investigation was ready to start, support the jury verdict for tampering with evidence.

The appeal notes that Kent appealed on the basis there was insufficient evidence for the material elements of the crime. The ruling says Kent tried to argue he did not know there was any investigation pending and therefore resetting his phone could not have been a criminal act.

Kent also argued that his sentence was disproportionate. The appeals court notes that Kent failed to provide the sentencing transcript for his appeal.

“The one-year sentence was well within the 9-to-36-month range of prison sentences for a third-degree felony. … Appellants are not persuasive and are not supported by the record,” the judges wrote.

The ruling stated that Kent erred in failing to raise his argument of a disproportionate sentence in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, and therefore his appeal on that basis is nullified.