City man sentenced to 1 year in prison for overdose death | News, Sports, Jobs

Staff photo / Ed Runyan Anthony D. Harris, 40, of Warren, left, was sentenced Monday in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court in connection with the February 2022 overdose death of Siara M. Garland of Canfield. With Harris is his attorney Tom Zena.

YOUNGSTOWN – A Warren man was sentenced to a year in prison Monday after pleading guilty Thursday to attempted involuntary manslaughter in connection with the February 2022 overdose death of a Canfield woman.

Anthony D. Harris, 41, of Austin Avenue SW, will serve the sentence concurrently with a three-year prison sentence he is serving in connection with a drug trafficking and drug possession conviction in Trumbull County. This means Harris will not receive additional prison time for the attempted involuntary manslaughter in Mahoning County.

Harris was transported from the Correctional Reception Center in Orient to Mahoning County for a hearing before Mahoning County Common Pleas Judge Anthony Donofrio on Monday.

Mahoning County Assistant Prosecutor Marty Hume said after the hearing that prosecuting Harris has become more difficult after Harris' co-defendant, Alan R. Hunt III, 55, of Clermont Avenue NE, Warren, died in August 2023.

Harris and Hunt were indicted in December 2022 on the same charges – bribing another person with drugs, trafficking in a fentanyl-like substance and manslaughter in connection with the death of 32-year-old Siara M. Garland.

The manslaughter charge accuses Hunt and Harris of causing Garland’s death when “immediate result” of Hunt and Harris, who committed or attempted to commit the fentanyl-related crime.

If Hunt and Harris had been found guilty of the charges, they could both have received prison sentences of around 20 years.

However, due to evidence problems, prosecutors agreed to a settlement with Harris.

Hume said prosecutors believe Harris sold the fentanyl to Hunt, who sold it to the person who gave it to Garland. He said there was evidence that potentially linked Harris to Hunt, but when Hunt died, there were doubts about whether that evidence could be used in Harris's trial.

The prosecution had evidence from phone conversations between Hunt and his girlfriend from prison that indirectly implicated Harris in the case, but due to the defendant's right to “confront” Her accusers – and Hunt is deceased – may not have admitted evidence from the prison interviews at trial, Hume said.

After Hunt's death, further interviews were conducted to obtain more evidence for the Harris case, but that was unsuccessful, Hume said. Prosecutors hoped Hunt would cooperate with prosecutors in the case, but his death eliminated that possibility, he said.

Harris's attorney, Tom Zena, filed a motion to dismiss the case in April and submitted a memorandum last week saying Hunt's death had “There is no evidence that could potentially incriminate Anthony Harris.”

“There is no evidence of any conversation or contact between Anthony Harris and Alan Hunt which can be proven to have been for the sole purpose of Alan Hunt obtaining drugs from Anthony Harris and of those drugs being delivered to the victim,” the filing states.