With his life and legal career a smoldering wreckage, on May 11 retired U.S. District Judge Samuel B. Kent was sentenced to 33 months in prison for one count of obstruction of justice, and the two women he abused finally got a chance to speak directly to the jurist who made their lives hell.
U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson of the Northern District of Florida handed down the sentence, which was a few months shy of the three years prosecutors recommended in a plea deal Kent agreed to in February. As part of that plea bargain, Kent pleaded guilty to the obstruction charge for making false statements to a 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals investigating committee looking into complaints against him. In a written statement, Kent admitted to nonconsensual sexual contact with two women as part his plea bargain.
