Trillo Denies Press Reports About Mattiello Incident 40 Years Ago

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Trillo Denies Press Reports About Mattiello Incident 40 Years Ago

Joe Trillo denies the report
Today, Independent candidate for governor Joe Trillo released the following statement regarding a 1975 incident with Nicholas Mattiello.

“In July of 1975, during a heated neighborhood incident, I went over to a next door neighbor’s house, because the young girl home was screaming that Nicholas Mattiello and several other boys were trying to push in the front door of the house.  I hollered at the boys, and was furiously waving my arms, at which time I may have accidentally come in contact with Nicholas Mattiello,” said Joe Trillo.  

WPRI is reporting that: "In a handwritten statement from Mattiello at the time, he said Trillo also threatened to run him and his friends over with a car.

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"The guy tried to scare me by comeing [sic] close to me with the car and almost hit me," Mattiello wrote in a witness statement.

One witness also alleged Trillo used a derogatory term for African-Americans while speaking to Mattiello's group, threatening that he would "get two [expletive] [racial slur] after you to crush your bones."

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Speaker Nick Mattiello
“According to a Cranston police report, Mattiello’s father went to the police two days after the incident to report it, which would indicate he did not find it to be serious.  At the time, our families were feuding over the fact that the two Mattiello boys were riding dirt bikes all around the neighborhood, and I feel this was his way of trying to get back at me,” Trillo said.

“If I had seriously injured Nicholas Mattiello or ever threatened bodily harm, his father or mother would have taken him to the police department immediately.”  

“Waiting two days to file a police report over something Nicholas Mattiello’s father claimed was so serious that he wanted to kill me, doesn’t add up.  This gives everyone involved a chance to create a fictitious narrative, including fabricating outrageous witness statements, including from children, which is what Mattiello’s father did,” Trillo said.

“I don’t agree with this police report, because it was one-sided.  The police officer who initially responded to the incident, did not want to do anything, other than take a report.  The bottom line is, I was found not guilty.  Since when does not guilty count for nothing.”

“In the police report, the responding officer, in his own words, described young Nicholas Mattiello as an ill-mannered, undisciplined little brat who had been a source of aggravation to other residents of the area, as well as to school authorities, and that although it was against his better judgement, he felt he had no other choice but to charge me with a misdemeanor.”

“This misdemeanor case went to trial in the 1970s, I was found not guilty, and our families eventually mended the relationship,” he concluded. 

This story was first published 10/12/18 5:20 PM


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