Judge denies request for early release of Adair

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

A judge has denied a request for early release from prison by a Canfield man convicted of embezzling $1.3 million from an Austintown trucking firm.

Judge Lou A. D’Apolito of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court denied the request by Scott Adair, an inmate at the Marion Correctional Institution.

In a written entry, the judge issued his ruling Tuesday without explanation and without conducting a hearing.

Adair, 52, has served nearly one year of his four-year prison term for aggravated grand theft, tampering with records, two counts of money laundering, complicity to theft and telecommunications fraud.

Adair and his wife, Linda, 55, stole the money from Southwind Trucking Inc.

Adair was the business’s co-founder, and his wife worked for the company.

She was sentenced to four years’ probation and 200 hours of community service.

A Southwind spokes-woman said last week that Ric Barringer, company owner, who bears the full debt-repayment burden from the theft, wanted Adair to serve his full prison term.

Attached to the motion for judicial release filed last week by Adair’s lawyer, James L. Burdon of Akron, were an evaluation describing Adair as a “very responsible and respectful inmate,” together with letters of character from family, friends, and a retired church pastor, which describe Adair as a devoted husband, father and Christian.