While NBC news anchor Brian Williams is under fire for comments made about being shot down in Iraq, it is hardly the first time a public figure has been caught in a half-truth, or outright lie -- and Rhode Islanders are no exception.
Whether in media, politics, or business, the capacity to embellish the truth -- or concoct an entirely false story -- has been the downfall of a number of prominent figures in the state.
SLIDES: 10 Biggest Fabrications in Rhode Island BELOW
Historian H. Philip West Jr, the former Executive Director of Common Cause Rhode Island and author of Secrets and Scandals: Reforming Rhode Island, 1986-2006, spoke to what he saw as some of the biggest fabrications -- and outright lies -- in political history in the state.
"The first deception-based scandal that comes to mind is RISDIC's claim that deposit security was "carved in stone" when their board knew they lacked resources," said West. "That led to the closing of the credit unions on January 1, 1991. The irony was that the House Finance Committee had killed legislation by Rep. Frank Gaschen years earlier that could have averted the disaster. Gov. DiPrete had received five credible warnings but was taking boatloads of campaign money from RISDIC players, and so he did nothing."
"Another would be former Sen. President William V. Irons, who always portrayed himself as an ardent reformer, often using the cry of ethics reform to attack others," said West. "Once in power, Irons (1) kept killing "pharmacy freedom-of-choice" legislation when he was head of the Senate Corporations Committee, (2) failed to disclose the insurance commissions he was collecting from CVS and Blue Cross, (3) spent three years trying to negotiate his way out of a finding of probable cause by the Ethics Commission, (4) went to court claiming "speech-in-debate" immunity from prosecution by the Ethics Commission, (5) won a badly flawed Supreme court ruling in his favor that ended the Ethics Commission's jurisdiction over legislative conflicts of interest, and (6) has left current Senate leaders five years to stonewall letting voters amend the state Constitution to bring them back under the commission's jurisdiction, like all the other public officials in Rhode Island. The three-justice majority (Williams, Flaherty, Robinson) built their decision on a false premise. In dissent, Justice Suttell got it right.
"In my view, the biggest deception [has been] the General Assembly's endless rationalizations aimed at blocking separation of powers," said West.
Related Slideshow: Rhode Island’s Ten Biggest Fabrications Ever Told
NBC news anchor Brian Williams, who is now under investigation by NBC over his now-retracted statement that he was in a helicopter in Iraq that was hit by enemy fire and forced to land, is hardly the first public figure to get caught up in an issue of a potential fabrication.
Below are ten incidents in Rhode Island where personalities in the public eye came under scrutiny for things said -- or done -- that might not have held up.
His famous line came back to haunt him, when it didn't hold up in court.
While he said there were "no stains on this jacket" in 2001 when he was indicted on 27 federal corruption charges, two time former Mayor of Providence Buddy Cianci was found to have one -- when he was convicted on one count of racketeering conspiracy in 2002 (following a nolo plea to assault in 1984).
Cianci's two felony convictions played a major role in the 2014 Providence Mayoral campaign, when the former Mayor ran on platform of past accomplishments and vision for the city -- while a well-funded effort by his opponents to discredit him for his criminal wrongdoings helped fuel Jorge Elorza to victory.
In 2008, DePetro was accused of falsifying ARBITRON rating books for his show on WPRO in Providence -- before blaming his wife. The books had significantly boosted the shows ratings, before they then took a tumble.
The briefly stellar ratings of controversy-dogged-talkmeister John DePetro’s Providence radio show tanked yesterday after a whiff of scandal forced Arbitron to reissue its spring survey of listener-dial habits.
In the 6 to 10 a.m. weekday slot occupied by the self-proclaimed “Independent Man” on WPRO-AM (630), “the reissue ranked WPRO at number nine” among valued 25- to 54-year-old listeners, “down from the number four rank in the original release,” program manager Paul Giammarco and station market manager Barbara Haynes announced in a joint statement.
He's been several alter egos over the years, but one turn as a love advice columnist turned out to be the wrong one for Rudy Cheeks.
In January 2011, Bruce McCrae (i.e. Rudy Cheeks) used material from Slate online column “Dear Prudence” by Emily Yoffe in his “Dr Lovemonkey” advice column. WRNI's Scott MacKay had the story.
A reader tipped off the Phoenix that the columns were similar.
When asked by Phoenix editors about the similarities, Cheeks admitted to using Yoffe’s work without attribution. The Phoenix notified Slate of the incident and apologized.’’
He was suspended for a month from Phillipe and Jorge and the Phoenix cancelled “Dr Lovemonkey."
When the former Providence Mayor ran for Congress in 2010, and claimed the city was in "excellent financial condition," perhaps David Cicilline was confused as to what constituted "excellent," as Mayor Angel Tevaras called it a Category 5 hurricane just months following.
"David Cicilline ruined Providence’s finances, he lied about it throughout the 2010 election cycle, and he’s lying about it today,” said former Congressional opponent Anthony Gemma. “Through the final weeks of his congressional campaign, David Cicilline denied tapping the undesignated surplus, or rainy day fund. He looked us in the eye and told us that close to $30 million was left in that account. He was lying through his teeth. The real number was around ten percent of that figure. And he knew it.”
In April 2012, Cicilline admitted he shouldn't have used the term "excellent" as he did in 2010.
“I should not have used that word,” Cicilline said to WPRI 12. “It obviously doesn’t describe the condition the city is in [and] it was never my intention to mislead people intentionally. I should have been much clearer the challenge the city faces."
While Brian Williams is taking heat for his misremembering being shot-or-not down in Iraq, Rhode Island has had its own case of alleged stolen valor.
After several brushes with the law, former Rhode Island State Representative Dan Gordon's claimed that his "problems stemmed from PTSD-fueled alcoholism, a product of his service in the Gulf War. He also claimed he was injured by shrapnel in Baghdad," according to the Huffington Post.
The Post went on to write, "The AP obtained Gordon's military records and discovered that he had never been near a battlefield while serving as a military aircraft technician. Records show he never received the Purple Heart -- an award typically given to any service member wounded in a war zone, unless the injury was caused by an accident or friendly fire -- contradicting his claims about being injured in Baghdad."
Gordon stood by his military record following the reports.
Former Congressional candidate Anthony Gemma garnered both local and national attention for his rapid rise in social media followers -- especially when it turned out most of those followers were not from Rhode Island.
"Who are the 20,000+ people subscribed to Anthony Gemma’s Facebook? And here’s a better question: what’s up with many of their unusual names? And why do most like “Unicorn City Film” as a movie?" wrote Sam Howard in RI.
Other candidates recently have been caught up in allegations that their campaigns were buying Twitter followers, including Romney and Newt Gingrich. That’s relatively easy to do online, costs only pennies apiece and is not illegal — only in violation of Facebook and Twitter terms of service.
But an oversized social footprint that suggests mass appeal can be embarrassing for a campaign should it be revealed.
"If a candidate abuses the appropriate channels to gin up their followings, they risk hurting their reputation as a grass-roots candidate," said Amy Brown with Harris Media LLC.
The winner of the first season of Survivor was convicted in 2006 of failing to pay taxes on his $1 million prize -- but Hatch said that he thought "producers were supposed to pay his “Survivor” taxes, and said the donations he took from his charity were far less than the money he had already poured into it," according to Today.
"Hatch’s lawyer, Michael Minns, said Hatch caught fellow contestants cheating and struck a deal with the show’s producers to pay his taxes if he won. But Hatch was never asked about the allegation when he testified."
Hatch served 51 months and maintains his innocence.
It happens, we know. Weather is hard to predict. And its better to be prepared than not.
But last week's snow was just one case in point, when winter storm Juno delivered a punch but far less than the knockout that had been ginned up.
With talk of it being a Snowmaggedon, it turned out not to be the snowpocalpyse that was predicted -- and nowhere more so than New York, where a meteorologist issued an apology
Meanwhile, this week's storm appeared to catch officials less prepared, as evidenced by the delayed plowing on the highways (and already poorly plowed side roads.)
Sheila Martines, the former Channel 10 personality who passed away in 2014 at the age of 58, found herself at the center of controversy following an incident where she was found in the trunk of car in Florida.
In 1988, Martines told authorities she was kidnapped, assaulted and locked in the trunk of her car for hours, before being found by neighbors.
Her fiance at the time, Bristol County District Attorney Ronald Pina, detailed the ordeal and attacker, but didn't offer anything more.
Channel 10 reported that Pina in a 1988 interview admitted her difficulties with alcohol abuse and outlined her goal of overcoming them. "She claimed she was abducted, but no arrests were ever made," said 10.
"I discovered that some underaged guests were consuming alcohol without my knowledge or consent. Upon discovering this, I started asking people to leave and turned those away arriving at the door. I stopped the party and sent people home. Dispersing the party, I checked that no drivers were under the influence," Esserman said in a statement.
The city conducted an evaluation of the incident the following weekend -- and then GoLocal learned that Esserman's daughter had broadcasted to friends on Facebook prior to the party that the celebration "would not be interrupted by police" and to bring booze and marijuana.
