Rhode Island
‘Conjuring House’ owner arrested, charged with DUI – The Boston Globe
“I am not a criminal. I have never been arrested,” she wrote in a text message.
According to Police Chief Stephen Lynch, officers received calls on Monday night reporting an erratic driver.
Police found the Lexus SUV after 9 p.m. stopped on Hill Road, and as officers approached the car, allegedly driven by Nuñez, the vehicle took off, according to a police report.
Nuñez allegedly drove 51 miles per hour in a 25-mile-per-hour zone, failed to stop for a stop sign, swerved into the opposite lane, and nearly drove off the road at different times during the pursuit, authorities said.
Eventually, Nuñez came to a stop on Wallum Lake Road, and officers approached the car with their guns drawn, the report states.
Body camera video footage shows Nuñez mumbling, “What’s wrong,” as officers approach her. Officers wrote they “detected the overwhelming odor of an alcoholic beverage emitting from her breath.”According to the police report and footage from police body-worn cameras released Thursday, she repeatedly told the officers that she owns The Conjuring House, and argued with them about why she did not pull over immediately.
Officers attempted to perform field sobriety tests, but the video shows Nuñez not following directions and laughing at officers. At one point she told police, “You’re boring me,” and accused them of trying to “save face” by administering the tests, the report states.
Police said she later refused a Breathalyzer test, but told officers she drank three cocktails that night. She was later shackled to a bed at the police station after she refused to stop “aggressively banging on the cell door and yelling,” police wrote.
In a series of text messages sent to the Globe, Nuñez claimed she passed a sobriety test and that police did not ask her to take a Breathalyzer.
She claimed police and others are “trying to drive me out of business.”
“I am terrified of this PD. I did drive past a stop sign and then pulled over on the shoulder when they approached,” she wrote. “I remember being panicked and terrified and sped up and then pulled over. I knew I was going to be harassed and possibly taken somewhere to be killed.”
Lynch said Burrillville officers are sometimes called to The Conjuring House, where Nuñez also lives, over traffic caused by curious onlookers. On Saturday night, Lynch said, Nuñez called police to report seeing former employees near the woods. Police responded but did not find anyone there, Lynch said.
During the summer, officers also went to The Conjuring House twice with a health care provider to check on Nuñez, who was brought to a hospital on one of those occasions, he said.
Last month, Nuñez told The Providence Journal the hospital stay was orchestrated by former employees in an attempt to take control of the house.
In a series of texts with the Globe, Nuñez referred to several medical facilities but declined to provide details. “Being thrown into facilities because I am complaining about crimes against me and my legitimate business does not mean that I have psychiatric issues,” Nuñez wrote.
The DUI charges follow other Conjuring House-related controversies in recent months. The 18th-century farmhouse was the inspiration for the 2013 movie “The Conjuring,” about hauntings that plagued the Perron family there in the 1970s. Visitors come from around the world to tour the property, and some even spend the night.
Former employees have said Nuñez owes them money, including one who said he was fired after Nuńez accused him of stealing money from the business – an accusation she said was based on a tip by the ghost of a former owner.
Guests have also complained about being asked to leave based on information she seemed to indicate was from spirits. Scott Kitlarz told the Globe he and his wife paid $1,089 to stay overnight at the house on Oct. 21. The Iowa couple left within a few hours after Nuñez asked if they were content creators and accused them of not having “good intentions,” adding, “I can feel your energy,” according to an audio recording Kitlarz provided to the Globe. He told the Globe she seemed to indicate that spirits had informed her about the Kitlarzs.
He said they brought cameras and microphones to try to capture anything otherworldly, but they are not content creators. The Conjuring House’s website states that guests may bring “ghost hunting equipment” but content creators must inform staff before they arrive. Kitlarz asked for a refund, which Nunez agreed to, but he said that as of Wednesday he had not received any part of the $1,089 he and his wife had paid.
When asked about Kitlarz’s experience, Nuñez texted that she “was alerted quickly to their intentions so I acted quickly.”
“No one with intent to hurt me or my business will get a refund,” she said.“I will not reveal my sources that look to protect me and TCH.”
Jason Hawes, the Rhode Island-based star of SyFy’s “Ghost Hunters” television show, has also accused Nuñez of harassing him and has said he is concerned about the safety of guests who stay there.
Amidst the controversies, “The Conjuring House” has remained open to visitors, though last week, Lynch opted not to immediately approve the entertainment license for the property, citing “inappropriate” attachments with its application. Nuñez can still resubmit her application though, before her current license expires in November, Lynch said.
When asked about the license, Nuñez said she will “pursue every option to run my legitimate business.”
“Burrillville will need a compelling reason to decline it,” she said in a text message.
Christopher Gavin can be reached at christopher.gavin@globe.com.
Rhode Island
Foulkes widens fundraising gap with McKee in Q3, has $840,000 in the bank
How to check your voter registration online in Rhode Island
Rhode Island voters can check their registrations and find their polling places on the Secretary of State’s website
Potential 2026 Rhode Island gubernatorial candidate Helena Foulkes expanded her fundraising advantage over incumbent Gov. Dan McKee in the third quarter of the year.
Foulkes, who lost the 2022 Democratic primary to McKee by 2 percentage points, raised $412,164 from July 1 through Sept. 30 and now has $842,441 in the bank, campaign spokesman Jon Romano said Thursday.
That’s nearly three times the $144,232 McKee raised in the third quarter, according to his filing with the Board of Elections. McKee finished September with $505,031 in the bank.
Second-quarter fundraising between the two rivals was much closer than in the third quarter, with McKee holding a slight advantage in new donations and Foulkes a narrow edge in total cash at the end of June.
The latest campaign finance figures were reported on a day that McKee clashed with Attorney General Peter Neronha, whom McKee accused of conducting a politically motivated investigation into the ILO Group school reopening contract to benefit Foulkes.
Neronha, who mulled running for governor himself a year ago, didn’t raise any money in the third quarter, according to his filing. He still has around $65,000 in the bank.
The largest campaign warchest in the state still belongs to House Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi, who raised another $73,000 from Oct. 8 to Oct. 28 and had $2.95 million in the bank. Shekarchi is unopposed for reelection to the House this year.
Senate President Dominick Ruggerio, also unopposed, raised $300 over the same period. He has $159,000 in the bank.
Rhode Island
Super PAC money flowing into R.I.’s U.S. Senate race leaves even the candidate it benefits confused • Rhode Island Current
A New York-based economic think tank has asked a super PAC with multiple addresses to remove its website from an ad campaign supporting the U.S. Senate campaign of Republican Patricia Morgan against Democratic incumbent Sheldon Whitehouse.
The request from the progressive Roosevelt Institute comes after the group Roosevelt Society Action aired a 30-second TV spot attacking Whitehouse as he seeks a fourth-term on Capitol Hill.
“After 18 years in Washington, Sheldon Whitehouse has left us waiting with wasteful spending and backroom deals,” a stern-voiced narrator says. “It’s time for real change — it’s time for Patricia Morgan.”
That message in support of Whitehouse’s GOP challenger played twice on Rhode Island TV sets during the Oct. 27 Sunday Night Football game that saw the San Francisco 49ers beat the Dallas Cowboys. The commercial is slated to air again, twice when the Indianapolis Colts play the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday, Nov. 3 and once during FOX’s college football game Saturday, according to recent filings with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
Roosevelt Society Action has addresses in Wisconsin and Alabama and one treasurer in Alabama who is listed with the Federal Election Commission (FEC). It also has at least $200,000 to spend in the Ocean State, according to an FEC filing.
The group doesn’t have a phone number or any public profile that would indicate why it’s interested in a U.S. Senate race in solidly blue Rhode Island. A Rhode Island Current poll conducted in September showed Whitehouse led Morgan 52% to 37%.
“That is bizarre,” Matthew Ulricksen, an associate professor of political science for the Community College of Rhode Island, said in an interview Wednesday. “It never even crossed my mind that a super PAC would be spending for Pat Morgan — something’s going on here.”
Targeting sports fans
A Rhode Island Current analysis of FCC documents found the group has committed $25,000 toward television ads during NFL and college football matches, as well as slots during the first four games of the World Series. The anti-Whitehouse ads have not aired during New England Patriots games — a team which sits at a 2-6 record.
Filings with the FEC also show Roosevelt Society Action spent over $102,000 for printing, postage, and design on pro-Morgan mailers starting Oct. 17.
Morgan, a West Warwick state representative who chose not to seek reelection to run for the U.S. Senate, told Rhode Island Current the outside spending was a welcome surprise in her uphill funding battle against Whitehouse — who has far and away the biggest campaign fund of any Rhode Island politician.
In the pre-election FEC filing submitted Oct. 24, Whitehouse’s campaign had $2.2 million on hand. Morgan reported around $62,000.
“It’s nice to know that there’s somebody else that understands this is an important race,” Morgan said. “Sheldon is really vulnerable and he has been so stridently hyperpartisan.”
The Whitehouse campaign does not see the super PACs sudden presence as a sign of vulnerability in his re-election bid.
“Out-of-state dark-money special interests are parachuting into Rhode Island because Sheldon is leading the charge to take away billionaires’ massive power in elections and at the Supreme Court,” campaign coordinator Laura Fusco said in a statement. “Rhode Islanders deserve to know who is trying to influence their votes.”
Super PAC’s origins obscure
Roosevelt Society Action’s statement of organization filed with the FEC lists one name associated with the group: Treasurer Kayla Glaze, an Alabama woman tied to Washington D.C. firm Crosby Ottenhoff Group — where she has worked as a certified public accountant since 2019, according to her LinkedIn profile.
The FEC website lists Glaze as the treasurer of more than 130 political action committees across the nation since 2019, most of which support Republican causes.
Glaze did not respond to multiple requests for comment via phone and email.
The PAC’s third quarter filing with the FEC lists a $200,000 contribution on Sept. 17 from a home in Hudson, Wisconsin — an address associated with Thomas Datwyler, a consultant who has headed up the financial operations for dozens of Republican candidates and political committees in recent election cycles.
Datwyler was accused of wire fraud by a GOP super PAC in Nevada in July and is under investigation by the Mississippi Attorney General for allegedly violating the state’s campaign finance and reporting laws. He was also briefly listed as the treasurer for former U.S. Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.), who later attacked Datwyler on X and accused the treasurer of wire fraud in a federal complaint.
“We do a lot of work around the country right from Hudson,” Datwyler said in an email Tuesday.
But he insists he is not behind Roosevelt Society Action. He said the group’s treasurer is Glaze.
Datwyler asked Rhode Island Current to email him with the filing showing his address being used. When forwarded a copy, he wrote back, “Oh man they have my home address!”
“I literally don’t know how they got my own address other than, maybe it’s like, on a bank for something, and then they just went with it,” he said in a phone interview Thursday.
Datwyler does have at least one Rhode Island connection: Timothy Mellon, the banking heir and railroad magnate who is among the top supporters of former president Donald Trump.
That is bizarre. It never even crossed my mind that a super PAC would be spending for Pat Morgan — something’s going on here.
– Matthew Ulricksen, an associate professor of political science for the Community College of Rhode Island
OpenSecrets found Mellon has spent over $165 million into the campaigns of Trump and other GOP congressional candidates this year. The Salt Lake Tribune in 2022 reported Mellon was among the top contributors to Liberty Champions PAC — of which Datwyler was the treasurer — to support the reelection of the U.S. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah).
But Datwyler said Mellon has no involvement in the Roosevelt Society Action, though he said it was possible Mellon did contribute to the group after the most recent FEC filing deadline, which was Oct. 16.
Datwyler said the Roosevelt Society Action PAC’s primary funder is a couple from Florida but he could not disclose their identity.
Roosevelt Institute ‘not affiliated in any way’
At the end of the PAC’s anti-Whitehouse ad is the link to a website, rooseveltinstitute.org.
But that website is for a progressive economic think tank in New York City connected to the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum. The Institute does have a project called the Roosevelt Society, but its listed purpose is to be “a community of people bonded by a pro-equity worldview — fighting for an economy and democracy that are more progressive.”
Institute spokesperson Meredith MacKenzie de Silva said the nonprofit is “not affiliated in any way with the Roosevelt Society PAC.”
“The Institute was not aware of the use of its URL by this PAC and is taking immediate action to stop it,” she said in a statement Thursday.
MacKenzie de Silva told Rhode Island Current the institute does have a PAC, but it’s called “Roosevelt Forward.”
“But we haven’t produced or paid for any political ads this cycle,” she said. “We have done some pretty wonky writing on economic proposals.”
Why spend in Rhode Island?
Though perplexed as to why Roosevelt Society Action has a sudden interest in Rhode Island’s U.S. Senate race, Ulricksen, the CCRI professor, has his theory: super PACs make money.
Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s controversial Citizens United ruling in 2010, Ulricksen said an industry has grown around super PACs and political nonprofits. OpenSecrets found over 2,400 super PACs have raised over $4.2 billion this election cycle, with $2.5 billion spent as of Oct. 30.
“The amount of money we spend on elections here in the United States is frankly quite sickening,” Ulricksen said. “It’s almost not even about the candidates anymore.”
Instead, he said the industry is more about self-styled consultants who pitch to deep-pocketed people who either know little about politics or might be passionate about a single issue or candidate. Those consultants can then take commission from expenditures from either production studios or printers they own.
“And that’s what makes it so difficult to put this cork back in the bottle — so many people are making money,” he said.
Another reason for the Roosevelt Society’s focus on Rhode Island is that right-leaning groups want Whitehouse to spend more money on his own race instead of transferring funds to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee to spend on tighter elections such as the race between Montana Democratic Sen. Jon Tester and GOP challenger Tim Sheehy.
“This could be an unofficially coordinated action,” Ulricksen said. “Never underestimate the banality or drollness of rich Americans to think that they can use their money to influence something.”
The Whitehouse campaign has spent $1.1 million toward TV ads since the summer, according to FCC filings.
The case of the unknown footage
The Roosevelt Society Action ad begins with stills of Whitehouse against a fiery background that shows the U.S. Capitol bathed in red. Glitchy visual overlays and ominous audio accompany the scene, before the voiceover proclaims,“It’s time for real change.”
Enter Morgan, who is seen in a montage of professionally-filmed clips where she strolls the white marble steps of the Rhode Island State House, works at her office desk and meets with constituents, some of them college students. The b-roll has a clearly staged quality and looks crisp in comparison to the Photoshopped inferno the ad uses to depict Whitehouse. But where the footage originated is unclear.
FEC rules prohibit campaigns from directly coordinating with super PACs, though there is some gray area on what can be done. Candidates in the past have uploaded b-roll to their YouTube channels, for PACs to later pick up and edit.
But none of the footage in Roosevelt Society’s ad was on any of Morgan’s social media pages. It’s certainly not from the Rhode Island House Minority Office, Chief of Staff Sue Stenhouse said Thursday.
Morgan, who represented the House District 26 seat from 2011 to 2019, returned to the General Assembly in 2021 after an unsuccessful run for governor. She is one of nine State House Republicans, but has not caucused with the party since her return.
“She’s not part of our caucus and that was by her decision,” Stenhouse said.
Stenhouse said the footage could have been shot for ads during Morgan’s 2018 gubernatorial bid. Morgan lost the primary 56.4% to 40.1% to then-Cranston Mayor Allan Fung (who went on to lose to Gina Raimondo in the general election).
Morgan confirmed the video clips are “older footage” from her time in the State House. But she was clueless as to how the Roosevelt Society obtained it.
“They didn’t contact me, I have no idea,” she said. “I honestly have no idea — I’m just happy that they’re here.”
GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.
Rhode Island
Body Found Near Bike Path In Cranston
CRANSTON, RI — A body was found near a bike path in Cranston on Wednesday morning, according to police.
Police said the man’s body was found at the bike path near Tongue Pond and Garfield Street. Cranston police have not identified the body.
Police said they called the Rhode Island Medical Examiner’s Office to determine the cause of death.
Find out what’s happening in Cranstonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.
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