Federal judge now in state custody

WASHINGTON, Nov. 7 (UPI) -- A former federal judge serving a prison sentence for lying about sexual assaults has been moved to protective custody in Florida, officials say.

Samuel Kent had been housed in a prison hospital in Massachusetts, the Houston Chronicle reported Friday. Kent, who had been a judge in U.S. District Court in Houston and Galveston in Texas, was sentenced to 33 months for lying about sexual assaults on female employees and still has 28 months to serve.

His lawyer, Dick DeGuerin of Houston, told the Chronicle Kent mostly handled civil cases and would be unlikely to meet anyone behind bars he had put there. He said the move to the Florida state prison system might be a matter of federal officials being "overly cautious."

John Gaither, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Prisons in Florida, said Kent was transferred to Florida custody Sept. 23.

"You can imagine why we're housing him there -- he's a federal judge," Gaither said.