ELLSWORTH, Maine — Editor's note: The video attached to this story was published June 1, 2023.
Eliot Cutler is no longer in custody, according to an administrator with Hancock County Jail.
Cutler, a wealthy Maine attorney and politician, was charged with four counts of possession of sexually explicit material of a child under the age of 12.
Prosecutors say Cutler had in his possession more than 80,000 images of children being sexually assaulted between 2014 and 2021.
Cutler pled guilty to the four charges on May 4, 2023, and a judge agreed to the plea arrangement.
Cutler was released Thursday morning on "good time," Hancock County Jail Administrator Timothy Richardson confirmed with NEWS CENTER Maine.
Good time, according to Maine legislature, allows a sentenced jail or prison resident to earn time for good behavior and engagement with work or programs, which can be tallied up to subtract from their sentencing duration.
Law enforcement officials were tipped off about the possible possession of sexually explicit material of children several months before his arrest. In December 2021, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children sent a tip to the Maine State Police alleging that someone in Maine had allegedly downloaded or uploaded an illegal image of a child under the age of 12.
Cutler was arrested at his home in Brooklin in March 2022, following an investigation that reportedly turned up thousands of videos and images of child sexual abuse material on his computer.
His homes in Brooklin and in Portland were both searched.
Cutler was brought to the Hancock County Jail at the time of his arrest but was released on $50,000 bail.
Upon conditions of release, Cutler was not to be permitted access to computers or other devices that provided him access to the internet, according to previous reporting, but a judge later granted his legal request for the use of one computer and one cellphone with monitoring software.
Per the plea agreement, Cutler began serving his four-year sentence with all but nine months suspended at the Hancock County Jail on June 1, 2023, and six years of probation. He was released Thursday, Jan. 18, two months earlier than the full term.
Cutler is required to register as a sex offender for the remainder of his life.
He twice ran unsuccessfully in a bid to serve as Maine's governor as an independent candidate in 2010 and 2014. The impact of his run during those gubernatorial races is believed to have helped pave the way for ranked-choice voting to be used in Maine elections.
This story is developing and will be updated.