PORTLAND, Ore. -- A Washington state man has been sentenced to two years in prison for stealing thousands of pounds of telephone wire off Cowlitz County poles and then selling it in Oregon.

Kevin Sexton, 40, was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Tacoma, Wash. for several incidents of phone wire theft and conspiracy to transport stolen goods over state lines. Two other men were convicted in the thefts as well.

Prosecutors alleged that Sexton and others would cut the wires early in the morning, remove the plastic insulating covers, and then transport it to Oregon, where it was sold to a Portland scrap metal dealer.

The men dropped a cell phone in a bush near one of the poles they took wiring from, and also left rubber insulation around a Longview, Wash., apartment complex, where one of the men lived, attorneys said.

In all, the men stole more than 3,500 pounds of wire and sold it for about $3,000, according to prosecutors.

“Kevin Sexton is more than just a thief and a drug addict ... He has been committing serious and violent crimes for 14 years and nothing seems to slow him down,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Mike Dion wrote in a sentencing memo.

The two other men involved in the thefts, 42-year-old Samuel Otton and 33-year-old Aaron Sweringen, will be sentenced at a later date.

Replacing the wire cost telephone companies more than $100,000, prosecutors said.

Sexton will also spend three years on supervised release after serving his prison sentence.