Kent R Hart

Kent Richard Hart was born on November 11, 1964, in Granger, Utah, the youngest of four children of Richard Lee and LaRae Ann Johnson Hart. He graduated from Granger High School in 1983 and went on to the University of Utah, where he majored in psychology and graduated Summa Cum Laude. Pursuing a lifelong goal of becoming an attorney, he earned his Juris Doctorate from the University of Utah's S.J. Quinney College of Law in 1992.

Kent passed the bar examinations in Nevada, New York, Connecticut, and Utah, and practiced law in Nevada and New York City before returning to Utah in 1999. There he spent six years in the appeals division of the Salt Lake Legal Defender Association, and in 2005 joined the Utah Federal Defender Office, where he served as an appeals attorney and a specialist in capital cases. He also devoted eleven years to teaching as an adjunct professor in the paralegal department at Salt Lake Community College.

A committed advocate for the criminal defense bar, Kent served as president and, beginning in 2009, executive director of the Utah Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, growing the organization to more than 500 members. His service was recognized with the ACLU of Utah's Mickey Duncan Award in 2011 and the Utah Minority Bar Association's Jimi Mitsunaga Award for excellence in criminal law in 2012. He loved his work of helping and serving others, and passed away on July 24, 2016.