Eliot Cutler, once a prominent Maine lawyer and politician, suddenly in his 70s becomes what police say is a serial law breaker?
Hard to fathom, even for those who have made a life’s work of studying the human condition.
“I don’t know that anyone has come up with an explanation,” says Steve Gotlieb, who taught deviant behavior for more than 30 years at Southern Maine Community College – and was once Cutler’s neighbor.
Gotlieb, a veteran of the U.S. Marines and Vietnam War who also worked as a police officer and detective in Old Orchard Beach, said the Cutler case confounds logic.
“He’s a brilliant guy – Harvard. He knows the sophistication of authorities following child-sex rings. He knows he’s under observation,” Gotlieb said in an interview with The Maine Wire. “Hard to believe he’s that obsessed and out of control.”
The Maine Wire reached out to Gotlieb’s expertise to try to understand why and how Cutler could have suddenly gone from respected public citizen to the underworld of child pornography before then violating probation and jumping bail.
Cutler, who twice ran as an “independent” for governor, nearly getting elected, pleaded guilty in 2023 to possession of sexual images of children.
Not long after he served a short jail term and was released on good behavior, Cutler was charged yet again, this time with violating the terms of his probation by using his computer equipment to reach out to a massage parlor looking for an “escort.”
In doing so, he allegedly violated the terms of his release from jail that included not using social media without supervision.
Shortly after being charged with violating his probation, Cutler allegedly was caught yet again in possession of sexually-explicit material.
So it’s now not just once, not just twice, but three times that the former Harvard-educated Cutler – husband, father, grandfather – has allegedly seriously run afoul of the law.
The obvious question is why? What happened? And how long has he been engaged in such behavior?
“What causes people to do this? Gotlieb asked. “Is there something that predisposes people to do this? With older people, some say maybe it’s a form of dementia.”
“When we were kids and we would do something stupid our parents would ask us ‘what were you thinking?’” Gotlieb noted. “But we were kids. Of course we weren’t thinking.”
In Cutler’s case, Gotlieb said, “all I can figure is there is something seriously wrong with such repeat behavior. There has to be some sort of mental or neurophysical issue.”
“Again,” Gotlieb added, “there’s no clear explanation about this form of behavior and, no treatment that’s been proven to successfully remedy this behavior. I don’t know if there’s ever been a successful diagnosis.”
Gotlieb, who grew up in Bangor and actually was Cutler’s neighbor in that city, later went on to the University of Maine at Orono, where he got a bachelor of science degree in education and sociology.
From there he went to the University of New England where he received a post-graduate degree.
Gotlieb began teaching at the community college in South Portland in 1972. He was there for 34 years, including 27 as chairman of its criminal-justice department.
