Disgraced former Maine gubernatorial candidate Eliot Cutler turned himself in at the Hancock County Jail on Tuesday morning after being accused of violating conditions of his release for a second time.
Cutler, 79, was convicted in 2023 of possessing thousands of sexually explicit images of children and sentenced to nine months in jail followed by six years of probation.
He was originally accused of violating the terms of his probation in Brooklin in September, when he allegedly sought information about an escort online and had two unauthorized cellphones.
In mid-December, Cutler appeared in court to deny those allegations, and a judge ordered that he pay $1,000 cash bail to stay out of custody. At that time, the judge denied the state’s request to bar Cutler from accessing the internet, though Cutler was ordered to submit an inventory of all of his electronic devices and allow a random search of his property.
After he was released on bail, Cutler was again accused of violating the conditions of his release on two separate occasions in late December and early January, according to court documents. A complaint was filed in court Monday.
Though court documents with more information about the allegations have been impounded by a judge, prosecutors hinted at the type of evidence they obtained in a separate court filing Monday.
The state asked the judge to impound the documents because they contain graphic or sexually explicit images, and “at least one of the images depict a relatively young female with reference to the word ‘girl,’” according to court documents.
Cutler voluntarily turned himself in at the Ellsworth jail Tuesday morning, according to his attorney and jail officials. He is being held with no bail, jail administrator Timothy Richardson said.
Hancock County District Attorney Bob Granger declined to share more about the allegations against Cutler on Tuesday. Granger said prosecutors had been working to schedule a hearing on Cutler’s alleged probation violation when the December and January incidents came to light.
Cutler’s attorney, Walter McKee, declined to comment on the recent allegations.
Cutler was sentenced to nine months after pleading guilty in 2023. Investigators said at the time that he had more than 80,000 images of children younger than 12 being sexually abused.
In January 2024, he was released two months early for good behavior.
Cutler previously worked in Washington, D.C., as a public servant, attorney and co-founder of an environmental law firm. He also ran twice for Maine governor, in 2010 and 2014, as an independent candidate. Following his guilty plea, he was disbarred in both New York and Maine.
