Former candidate in Maine arrested on child porn charges

PORTLAND, Maine — Two-time Maine gubernatorial candidate Eliot Cutler was arrested for possession of kid pornography on Friday, two days after search warrants have been executed on his two houses within the state.

Cutler, 75, ran for governor twice as an impartial and used his private wealth to bankroll each campaigns.

He was charged with 4 counts of possession of sexually express materials of a kid beneath 12, Hancock County District Legal professional Matthew Foster mentioned. Every carries a most penalty of 5 years in jail.

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The counts correspond with alleged crimes from December by March, and supplies are nonetheless being reviewed, Foster mentioned.

“It wouldn’t shock me if extra fees have been on the way in which,” Foster mentioned.

Cutler was arrested with out incident by the Maine State Police Pc Crimes Unit on the house he and his spouse share in Brooklin, a coastal neighborhood 130 miles (210 kilometers) from Portland, officers mentioned. He was booked into the Hancock County Jail with bail set at $50,000.

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Cutler’s protection legal professional confirmed the arrest however declined additional remark Friday. Cutler additionally declined remark this week.

The arrest following a two-month investigation was a shock in Maine, the place Cutler is a widely known political determine and rich legal professional.

Cutler battled to a detailed end within the governor’s race in 2010, shedding to Republican Paul LePage by lower than 2 proportion factors. 4 years later, he got here in a distant third place, behind LePage and Democrat Michael Michaud.

FILE- Former Impartial gubernatorial candidate Eliot Cutler attends an power discussion board on the College of Southern Maine, on Sept. 12, 2014, in Portland, Maine. (AP Photograph/Robert F. Bukaty, File)
(AP Photograph/Robert F. Bukaty, File)

After operating for governor, Cutler oversaw the institution of a Skilled and Graduate Middle initiative for the College of Maine System that mixed a number of areas of research.

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In Washington, Cutler served as an aide to the late Democratic U.S. Sen. Edmund Muskie and later as former Democratic President Jimmy Carter’s high adviser for environmental and power points.

Cutler went on to function an environmental legal professional and helped discovered a regulation agency in Washington, D.C.

The Bangor native later returned to Maine and resided in Cape Elizabeth, the place he owned a mansion that he later bought for $7.55 million to a nephew of former President George H.W. Bush.

On Wednesday, regulation enforcement officers searched his present houses, a townhome on Pine Avenue in Portland’s West Finish and an 1850 farmhouse on the waterfront in Brooklin.

Cutler resigned the identical day from the Lerner Basis’s board of administrators “for private causes,” mentioned Don Carpenter, govt director of the nonprofit that helps rural college students attend school.

He was beforehand concerned in “high-level technique and governance” and did not come into direct contact with college students, Carpenter mentioned.