Rhode Island

How the decision to honor a Trump ally tore apart a Hall of Fame

Published

2 years ago

February 17, 2024

How the decision to honor a Trump ally tore apart a Hall of Fame

EAST PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island — For nearly 60 years, the Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame has inducted notables into its ranks, providing this tiny state with a boost of pride.

Its honorees have ranged from Roger Williams, Rhode Island’s founder, to Martha McSally, the first American woman to fly a fighter jet in combat, all recognized for having “brought credit” to the state where they lived or were born.

Then came the matter of Michael Flynn.

In December, it emerged that Flynn — a Rhode Island native, retired lieutenant general and former national security adviser who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI and was later pardoned by Donald Trump — would be inducted into the Hall of Fame at its annual banquet this spring.

At least nine members of the organization’s board resigned in response. Some of this year’s other inductees said they would decline the honor. The husband of one of the board members who had resigned reported the group’s former longtime president to the Internal Revenue Service.

Of all the institutions torn apart by the rise of Trump’s brand of politics and ensuing backlash, this may be the smallest and most unusual.

In interviews, half a dozen former board members expressed disbelief and sadness at how the gale-force winds of partisan politics had wrecked the organization’s reputation. The columnist for the Boston Globe who first reported Flynn’s impending induction acerbically called the body a “hall of shame.” A previous honoree chastised the board for elevating a “radioactive” candidate like Flynn.

A key figure in the dispute is Patrick Conley, an 85-year-old lawyer with a pugilistic temperament who serves as Rhode Island’s official “historian laureate.” Conley was president of the Hall of Fame for 20 years until 2023 and still holds sway over the organization.

Conley defended Flynn’s induction to the Hall of Fame in an opinion piece in the Providence Journal. The decision to honor Flynn had been the subject of “vile coordinated protest,” he wrote in late December. The board would not withdraw Flynn’s induction but would defer it to “a more peaceful and rational time.”

He gave no indication of when that time would be.

Conley didn’t respond to repeated requests for comment. Lawrence Reid, the Hall of Fame’s president, declined to speak with The Washington Post. Flynn did not respond to a request for comment on his induction.

John Parrillo teaches history at a local university and served on the Hall of Fame’s board for seven years before stepping down in late December, saying he disagreed with Flynn’s “far-right, militaristic” vision for America.

“It tears my heart out that I had to leave it,” Parrillo said. “We’ve never talked politics.”

Inductees are celebrated at an annual ceremony opened by bagpipes and studded with local dignitaries. Each receives a statuette, a replica of the “Independent Man” atop Rhode Island’s State House. Parrillo already had his nominee for 2025 picked out: novelist Cormac McCarthy, who was born in Providence and died last year.

The nation’s tiniest state — just 48 miles in one direction and 37 miles in the other — longs for recognition. “Some say we’re a small state with a big inferiority complex,” said one former board member, who like several others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters. “This idea that there are Hall of Famers, great people, honorable people, is something Rhode Island craves in its psyche.”

It’s a small state in other ways, too. Parrillo lives in Middletown, Flynn’s hometown, and knew Flynn’s mother (“a wonderful person”). But when he learned that Flynn had received a majority of the board’s votes, he was stunned. “I said, ‘Holy cripe,’” Parrillo recalled. “They have every right to do whatever they want, but we shouldn’t put controversial people in the Hall of Fame.”

The controversy around Flynn goes beyond pleading guilty to a felony, a plea he later sought to withdraw before receiving a presidential pardon. He is also a high-profile proponent of conspiracy theories surrounding the 2020 election, which he baselessly claims was stolen.

In December 2020, he was part of a group that urged Trump to direct the military to seize voting machines, witnesses told a congressional committee. When Flynn was questioned by legislators investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, he repeatedly invoked his Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself. He has toured the country telling audiences that America is in the middle of a “spiritual war” and called for the nation to embrace “one religion” during an appearance at an evangelical megachurch.

None of that information was provided to the Hall of Fame’s board members when they gathered on a November evening at a red-brick office park in East Providence. In the packet of background material they received on the 18 candidates under consideration, there were three pages marked with Flynn’s logo: a biography highlighting his military service and role as national security adviser, together with a long list of commendations, according to a copy reviewed by The Post.

The next morning, John Tarantino, a prominent Rhode Island lawyer who had recently joined the board, sent an email to his fellow directors. “I have struggled since I learned … that Gen. Michael Flynn is a nominee for admission to the 2024 class,” he wrote in a message obtained by The Post. He noted that the trustees of the University of Rhode Island had voted unanimously to strip Flynn of his honorary doctorate, citing his felony plea and controversial comments.

Honoring Flynn would “jeopardize the success of our signature event” and force the board to answer “unnecessary and difficult questions” from the media for which “it would be hard to provide credible and reasonable responses,” he noted in the email. Tarantino urged his fellow board members not to vote for Flynn when they mailed in their ballots.

The following month, the board met via Zoom, former members said. That’s when it was announced that Flynn’s nomination had been approved, after receiving a majority of the 19 votes.

Ann Marie Maguire, who was the group’s treasurer, said her reaction to the news was one of total shock. “We just kind of sat there and said, ‘What?’” she recalled.

The resignation letters began arriving the next morning. Tarantino and Beatrice Lanzi, a former state legislator, wrote that the decision to honor Flynn was “disturbing” and “astounding.” (Tarantino declined to comment, and Lanzi did not respond.) Other resignations, Maguire’s included, swiftly followed.

One former board member dryly likened the decision to honor Flynn to a local Humane Society voting to support people harming animals. “It contradicts the mission,” the board member said.

But Conley — who describes himself as the organization’s “volunteer general counsel” — disagreed. In a Dec. 15 email sent to board members, Conley said he knew a college classmate of Flynn’s, who recalled him as patriotic and upright. “Has this leopard changed his spots?” Conley asked.

Flynn was the victim of a “weaponized FBI,” Conley continued, echoing a common Trump complaint. As a result, “I sought to vindicate Flynn in his home state.”

Maguire, the former treasurer, said that many of the Hall of Fame’s board members, including herself, were once students of Conley’s at Providence College, where he taught for many years. Conley brought Rhode Island history to vivid, pulsating life, she said. She described his class as the best course she ever took.

But when she joined the board, Maguire, 72, said she was startled by her former professor’s domineering ways, which included berating directors, particularly women.

Former board member Roberta Feather — a longtime professor of nursing at the University of Rhode Island — said that Conley called her a sexist slur in November during a disagreement over the process for putting forward a different nominee. Reached later by the Providence Journal, Conley acknowledged making the remark.

Feather and her husband, James Hackett, an attorney, said they found Flynn’s induction and Conley’s behavior unacceptable. In January, Hackett reported Conley to the IRS for potentially violating rules against “self-dealing” in a 2020 transaction in which Conley transferred his waterfront home, known as Gale Winds, to a foundation Conley runs. Conley said last month in an email to a reporter that he may have unknowingly run afoul of IRS rules.

On a recent afternoon at Gale Winds, a dark blue sedan with the license plate “JDPHD” was parked in the driveway (Conley has both a law degree and a doctorate). Just beyond the house were the waters of eastern Narragansett Bay, slate gray under a cloudy January sky. The woman who answered the door said Conley was unavailable.

Meanwhile, at least three of this year’s other inductees — the head of a breast cancer foundation, a former member of Congress and a nationally recognized oncology researcher — said they would decline the honor in the wake of the Flynn controversy.

The Hall of Fame’s annual banquet is still scheduled to take place in April. Flynn isn’t mentioned anywhere on the invitation. The current iteration of the organization’s website lists only nine board members, and the roles of vice president and treasurer are vacant.

Maguire, who resigned as treasurer, said the board needs to be overhauled for the organization to continue. While she describes herself as a former Trump fan, she has no admiration for Flynn, noting that he admitted to breaking the law.

“There are people from Rhode Island who have done so much,” she said. “Those are the people we should put on a pedestal, not Michael Flynn.”

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Rhode Island

RI Lottery Mega Millions, Numbers Midday winning numbers for March 6, 2026

Published

6 hours ago

March 7, 2026

Press Room

The Rhode Island Lottery offers multiple draw games for those aiming to win big.

Here’s a look at March 6, 2026, results for each game:

Winning Mega Millions numbers from March 6 drawing

08-19-26-38-42, Mega Ball: 24

Check Mega Millions payouts and previous drawings here.

Winning Numbers numbers from March 6 drawing

Midday: 8-6-2-3

Evening: 1-8-7-4

Check Numbers payouts and previous drawings here.

Winning Wild Money numbers from March 6 drawing

02-08-16-26-32, Extra: 24

Check Wild Money payouts and previous drawings here.

Winning Millionaire for Life numbers from March 6 drawing

04-10-29-48-50, Bonus: 03

Check Millionaire for Life payouts and previous drawings here.

Feeling lucky? Explore the latest lottery news & results

Are you a winner? Here’s how to claim your prize

Prizes less than $600 can be claimed at any Rhode Island Lottery Retailer. Prizes of $600 and above must be claimed at Lottery Headquarters, 1425 Pontiac Ave., Cranston, Rhode Island 02920.
Mega Millions and Powerball jackpot winners can decide on cash or annuity payment within 60 days after becoming entitled to the prize. The annuitized prize shall be paid in 30 graduated annual installments.
Winners of the Millionaire for Life top prize of $1,000,000 a year for life and second prize of $100,000 a year for life can decide to collect the prize for a minimum of 20 years or take a lump sum cash payment.

When are the Rhode Island Lottery drawings held?

Powerball: 10:59 p.m. ET on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday.
Mega Millions: 11:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday and Friday.
Lucky for Life: 10:30 p.m. ET daily.
Millionaire for Life: 11:15 p.m. ET daily.
Numbers (Midday): 1:30 p.m. ET daily.
Numbers (Evening): 7:29 p.m. ET daily.
Wild Money: 7:29 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.

This results page was generated automatically using information from TinBu and a template written and reviewed by a Rhode Island editor. You can send feedback using this form.

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Rhode Island

For survivors, Rhode Island clergy abuse report brings vindication and renewed demands

Published

18 hours ago

March 6, 2026

Press Room

For survivors, Rhode Island clergy abuse report brings vindication and renewed demands

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — The sound of the school nurse’s office door opening. Light reflecting off a stained-glass window. Tearful outbursts and fear of getting on the school bus.

For many survivors of clergy abuse, memories like these linger for decades.

A report released this week by the Rhode Island attorney general detailed decades of abuse inside the state’s Catholic Diocese of Providence, identifying 75 clergy members who sexually abused more than 300 children since 1950. The investigation drew on thousands of church records and years of interviews with victims and witnesses. Officials said the true number of victims is likely much higher.

But survivors say the numbers capture only part of the story. Behind each case, they say, are childhood fragments that resurface years later — along with the long struggle to understand what happened.

Many survivors spent decades searching for answers and pressing authorities to investigate. Now some are speaking publicly about what they endured and what they hope will come next: broader support for survivors, help from the church to pay for therapy and counseling, and accountability from Catholic leaders.

From survivor to advocate

“I can still hear the click of the hardware in that metal door opening to this very day,” said Dr. Herbert “Hub” Brennan, an internal medicine doctor who lives and works in his hometown of East Greenwich, Rhode Island, where he grew up in a devoutly Catholic family.

Brennan was sexually abused in elementary school by the Rev. Brendan Smyth, an Irish priest who arrived in the community in the 1960s. Brennan was an altar server at Our Lady of Mercy Parish when the abuse began in the church sacristy.

Dr. Herbert “Hub” Brennan, a clergy abuse survivor, displays a 1995 newspaper showing a headline that reads “Diocese has no complaints about jailed priest” at his internal medicine office in East Greenwich, R.I., Thursday, March 5, 2026. Credit: AP/Leah Willingham

Brennan says a nun would pull him from class and send him to wait in the principal’s office until Smyth arrived and led him into the nurse’s room.

“They say that rape is one of the few crimes where the victim feels the shame,” Brennan said. “But the shame is enormous. And then the secrecy that follows to hide that shame gets in the way of healing.”

Brennan confronted it years later when a newspaper arrived on his doorstep in 1995. The headline about Smyth’s arrest in Ireland read: “Diocese has no complaints against jailed priest.”

Smyth was later convicted of assaulting children at least 100 times over four decades.

Dr. Herbert “Hub” Brennan, a clergy abuse survivor, shows at a 1995 newspaper article about the arrest of the Rev. Brendan Smyth while at his internal medicine office in East Greenwich, R.I., Thursday, March 5, 2026. Credit: AP/Leah Willingham

When Brennan later tried to discuss the abuse with a parish priest, he said he was assured there had been no complaints, only to learn later the priest had been Smyth’s roommate.

The revelation pushed Brennan to seek accountability. He later worked with attorney Mitchell Garabedian and settled in Massachusetts Superior Court.

“I needed to make sure that others knew exactly what was going on in this diocese — if it happened to others, who was responsible and how they were hiding it,” Brennan said.

The report released this week felt like a culmination of that effort, he said: “That allowed me to switch from survivor-victim to advocate.”

Breaking the ‘wall of secrecy’

For Claude Leboeuf, amber light streaming through stained-glass windows still triggers painful memories.

Leboeuf, who was abused by a priest as a child in neighboring Massachusetts and now advocates for victims in Rhode Island, called the report an important step toward dismantling what he calls the church’s “wall of secrecy.”

Leboeuf said his memories resurfaced only a few years ago, prompting him to pursue legal action and speak publicly about what happened to him.

“There’s a need to do something for these people — something real: money, tuition, therapy,” he said. “The effects are real; they last a long, long time.”

In a video statement, Bishop of Providence Bruce Lewandowski said the report describes a “tragic history” of abuse that caused lasting harm to victims and their families. He said he felt “extreme sadness” and “intense shame” while reading it and apologized to survivors for church leaders’ past failures to protect children. Lewandowski said the diocese has since implemented safeguards aimed at responding quickly to allegations and preventing abuse.

Leboeuf rejects that framing.

“It’s not old history. It’s justice denied for more than 60 years for some people,” he said. “These are people who brought their complaints to the diocese as kids in the 1960s, and they were ignored, ridiculed, even punished.”

Fighting to be believed

Ann Hagan Webb remembers the dread she felt before the school bus arrived each morning. Webb was only a kindergartner when her parish priest began sexually abusing her at school in Rhode Island.

The abuse took place between 1957 and 1965, during which Webb — who was abused from the age of 5 to 12 — remembers tearful outbursts before school, sometimes needing to be pulled onto the bus.

It wasn’t until decades later, at 40, that Webb turned to therapy to help process the memories. But when she was ready to report the abuse, Webb was met with hostility.

Initially, she asked only for compensation to cover her therapy bills. Still, she was met with skepticism, with leaders at the Diocese of Providence demanding her medical records and questioning the veracity of her claims.

Webb turned to advocacy, becoming known as a force for survivors of clergy abuse. In 2019, she helped convince the Rhode Island Legislature to enact legislation dubbed “Annie’s Law,” which allows child sexual abusers to be held civilly accountable to victims.

The advocacy has been exhausting, Webb said, and she still faces stigma when speaking publicly. Her abuse is often overlooked, she says, because many assume clergy abuse affected only boys.

“For 32 years, the diocese has called me not credible. I can’t tell you what that feels like,” Webb said.

The release of the attorney general’s investigation has renewed her hope that change and justice are still on the horizon.

“It feels like vindication,” she said.

“I hope the public demands their church be different,” she added.

A long-coming reckoning

The Rhode Island investigation comes at a time when examining possible clergy abuse is no longer unusual.

The shift is a far cry from 2002, when The Boston Globe exposed the Boston Archdiocese’s practice of moving abusive priests between parishes without warning parents or police, prompting investigations around the world.

That reckoning took decades longer in Rhode Island. With one of the highest Catholic populations per capita in the country — nearly 40% — the Diocese of Providence maintained secrecy around clergy abuse even as accusations and lawsuits surfaced over the years.

Attorney Tim Conlon, who has long represented sex abuse victims in Rhode Island, said that when he first filed suits against the Diocese of Providence, many people were unwilling to believe such allegations could be true in their own parishes. At one point in the late 1990s, he said, even his mother questioned whether he was doing the right thing.

State law has also made it difficult for victims to seek justice, Conlon said, citing strict limits on civil suits against institutions like the Catholic Church and narrow statutes of limitations for second-degree sexual assault.

“Clearly there’s a call for reform,” Conlon said. “The magnitude of the need is well documented.”

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Rhode Island

RI Lottery Numbers Midday, Numbers Evening winning numbers for March 5, 2026

Published

1 day ago

March 6, 2026

Press Room

The Rhode Island Lottery offers multiple draw games for those aiming to win big.

Here’s a look at March 5, 2026, results for each game:

Winning Numbers numbers from March 5 drawing

Midday: 8-6-6-2

Evening: 8-1-9-8

Check Numbers payouts and previous drawings here.

Winning Wild Money numbers from March 5 drawing

03-08-09-14-30, Extra: 31

Check Wild Money payouts and previous drawings here.

Winning Millionaire for Life numbers from March 5 drawing

17-20-23-30-33, Bonus: 05

Check Millionaire for Life payouts and previous drawings here.

Feeling lucky? Explore the latest lottery news & results

Are you a winner? Here’s how to claim your prize

Prizes less than $600 can be claimed at any Rhode Island Lottery Retailer. Prizes of $600 and above must be claimed at Lottery Headquarters, 1425 Pontiac Ave., Cranston, Rhode Island 02920.
Mega Millions and Powerball jackpot winners can decide on cash or annuity payment within 60 days after becoming entitled to the prize. The annuitized prize shall be paid in 30 graduated annual installments.
Winners of the Millionaire for Life top prize of $1,000,000 a year for life and second prize of $100,000 a year for life can decide to collect the prize for a minimum of 20 years or take a lump sum cash payment.

When are the Rhode Island Lottery drawings held?

Powerball: 10:59 p.m. ET on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday.
Mega Millions: 11:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday and Friday.
Lucky for Life: 10:30 p.m. ET daily.
Millionaire for Life: 11:15 p.m. ET daily.
Numbers (Midday): 1:30 p.m. ET daily.
Numbers (Evening): 7:29 p.m. ET daily.
Wild Money: 7:29 p.m. ET on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.

This results page was generated automatically using information from TinBu and a template written and reviewed by a Rhode Island editor. You can send feedback using this form.

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