Dear Representatives,
Today’s apology is a word salad, and it appears to have been created with the NHCADSV – a compromised agency in the YDC cases.
If “victim blaming” is never appropriate, why did the NHCADSV say and do nothing when the State and AG Gordon MacDonald’s Office dismissed David Meehan et al. v NH (filed by Russ Rilee Esq) for “victim negligence”?
You can never “work together to ensure accountability” if you dismissed Leah Cushman from the panel when she asked for people to appear and make statements under oath. If members of the public were prepared to make statements under oath, what are you all hiding that you don’t want state employees to make statements under oath?
The kids at YDC were sexually, mentally, and physically abused. The State covered it up. This is now an established fact.
The attorneys who worked for the State at the time (David Vicinanzo and members of his law firm, members of Shaheen & Gordon Law firm while Chuck Douglas was heavily involved in the judiciary) must have known about the cover-ups, and I am told that some members of Nixon Peabody did know. But now, these lawyers get 30-40% of each settlement while Joelle Wiggin works for Nixon Peabody and David Meehan against the State, having switched sides from the NHCADSV funded solely by the State and federal grants and working for the State.
For there to be any kind of accountability, you MUST put AGs from the time to present on the stand, including
AG Jeffrey Howard (now on the First Circuit and under whom David Vicinanzo’s son apprenticed).
AG Kelly Ayotte who worked in the AGs office at the time (now Governor Ayotte, who has a duty under oath to the citizens of NH).
AG (now NH Supreme Court Chief Justice) Gordon MacDonald, who dismissed David Meehan’s case for “victim negligence.”
David Vicnanzo Esq. who was a Federal Prosecutor for New Hampshire in the 1990s and who was heavily involved in child sex crimes.
Former US Attorney Jane Young, who worked for Gordon MacDonald when the David Meehan case was dismissed and admitted a conflict of interest to Michael Lewis Esq in September 2023.
John Stephen, who was head of the DHHS at the time the abuse took place.
The NHCADSV who were involved in all the commissions and meetings for child sex abuse from the 1990s onwards and who are the organization that the Department of Corrections contracts for Prison Rape Elimination Act. Who are they working for ? The AG’s office, the department of corrections , the DCYF or Nixon Peabody, Shaheen & Gordon, Chuck Douglas who are suing the State?
Joelle Wiggin who switched sides from working for the State to working for Nixon Peabody against the State in the David Meehan case.
Chuck Douglas, who was NH Supreme Court Chief Justice and ordered a child who was impregnated at YDC to return to YDC after a State-funded abortion because she would not name her rapist. Chuck Douglas, who is now making money from claims of child sex abuse at YDC and who is Chair of The Judicial Selection Committee – thus having a hand in who gets to judge these cases. And, as is clear from the Judge’s statements following the David Meehan case, he was not impartial and nor did he chastise the jury for not following jury instructions after the trial and addressing their concerns with him. Instead, he sympathized with the attorneys to whom the jurors turned, and the attorneys then used that to leverage their case. WMUR reported on it, and WMUR’s director of public affairs is married to Amanda Grady Sexton of NHCADSV, who works with the attorneys, police and prosecutors to shape the narrative – per her own statements here, which she co-authored with Steven J Kelly Esq who partnered with Chuck Douglas to sue St Paul’s School in multiple Doe v St Paul’s School suits while David Vicinanzo represented not only the NHCADSV but also “intervenors” at St Paul’s School who didn’t want the grand jury report published despite the school’s waiver of privacy.
The issue of abuse (physical, mental, sexual) continues today in New Hampshire’s youth facilities, as has been pointed out by Ashley George, who wrote a letter about it in 2024 to US Attorney Jane Young. She was let go from her job at one such facility a day after she protested on behalf of YDC victims.
There is abuse at Merrimack County Jail as well. This has gone unaddressed.
Ten years from now, David Vicinanzo’s son Matt will most likely be among those suing the state for child sex abuse going on in 2024, and the cycle continues.
Stop the word salad and get accountability. That means getting those above and others on the stand and having them answer questions under oath.
Why should taxpayers pay anything before there is accountability from the lawyers and agency heads who were around then and are around now carrying on with no accountability?
.
We’d like to thank Claire Best for the Op-Ed. As a reminder, authors’ opinions are their own and may not represent those of Grok Media, LLC, GraniteGrok.com, its sponsors, readers, authors, or advertisers. Submit Op-Eds to steve@granitegrok.com
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