YOUNGSTOWN — Judge John Durkin has again denied a request by former Austintown trustee and former Poland Township police officer Steve Kent, 55, to be released early from prison.

The Mahoning County Common Pleas Court judge ruled against the request last week without comment. Durkin also denied a similar request last December.

Durkin sentenced Kent in September 2023 to one year in prison after Kent was convicted at trial of tampering with records, but an appeal delayed his report date to prison.

He is due for release Sept. 11, according to the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction website. But he and his attorney asked last month for judicial release, which is an early release from prison granted by the sentencing judge.

Kent requested the early release May 13 through attorney A. Ross Douglas, who stated that Kent “committed the offense under circumstances that are unlikely to recur”; that Kent “has been imprisoned for a substantial period of time”; and his “separation from his family has taken a toll since they are deprived of (Kent’s) affection, care and support.”

Douglas also stated that “During the perpetration of the act, (Kent) did not cause any physical harm to any person.”

Ohio Assistant Attorney General Kara Keating countered that judicial release “is not appropriate in this case. At the time of the offense, (Kent) was a law enforcement officer, sworn to uphold the law, protect the public and serve the community.”

The filing continued, “Knowing that an investigation was (or about to be) in progress, (Kent) broke the law he swore to uphold for his own selfish interests.”

Kent’s conviction was for destroying evidence by performing a factory reset on his phone within a day of learning that a parent in the Poland Local Schools was going to report him to the school district and Poland Township police, where he worked, according to testimony in his trial.

The report to the school district and police was in relation to allegations that he had engaged in an inappropriate relationship with a student while working as school resource officer, but a jury found him not guilty of those allegations.