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Why is state Supreme Court Justice Barbara Hantz Marconi is on administrative leave — a drastic action rarely taken by a sitting jurist? New Hampshire officials won’t say.

Is it related to the grand jury now reportedly convened to consider criminal charges against husband, Geno Marconi? Again, no word.

“This must shake the faith that citizens should expect to have in their public institutions and those who work for them as well as those who have oversight for them,” the New Hampshire Union-Leader editorialized this weekend.

Without information from the Sununu administration or the judiciary, speculation has turned to Geno Marconi and his troubled past.

Geno Marconi was placed on leave as the Director for the New Hampshire Division of Ports and Harbors in April. The reasons for the action have not been made clear, but it has been known for weeks that he is being investigated by the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office.

NHPR reports witnesses are being called to testify before a grand jury. Grand jury proceedings are secret and officials will not comment unless and until indictments are handed up.

Marconi’s colorful past includes 2006 allegations he misused public resources for his own benefit, that he took improper gifts like lobsters and liquor in his role as ports director, and he used racist slurs about a ship captain trying to do business with the state.

The troubling aftermath of the 2006 complaints against Marconi include a drive-by shooting at the home of one of the witnesses and alleged other threats. No one was ever charged for shooting or other threats, and Marconi has denied involvement.

Last week, the public learned for the first time that Justice Hantz Marconi has been recusing herself from cases involving the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office. Though she has sat in on oral arguments in cases involving the state’s top law enforcement agency, Hantz Marconi has reportedly not taken part in deliberations or decisions in those cases. 

Geno Marconi kept his job after apologizing in 2006 for reportedly calling a ship captain of Middle Eastern descent a “sand n*gger” a “camel jockey,” and a “towel head.” He was also accused of calling someone else a “New York Jew with the chink wife.” 

Geno Marconi told investigators that while he likely did use the term “sand n*gger” it was not about that particular captain. He also denied making the other remarks. He was required to undergo sensitivity training as a result of the investigation.

There were also complaints about his management practices. According to a New Hampshire Attorney General’s supplemental report, Marconi took advantage of his position in several ways: he used his state-issued truck for personal errands like picking up sheetrock; he used a state forklift to drop private boat moorings; stored his private boat as a state dock; and took gifts like lobsters, pheasant, and a bottle of ouzo from ship captains and fishermen who did business with the Port of New Hampshire.

Portsmouth Development Authority Officials would tell investigators that while Marconi operated within the rules in those instances, reforms would be considered going forward. 

A year later, Bill Roach, one of the longshoremen who complained about Marconi’s behavior, reported someone shot at his Rye home. Soon after that, a fake headstone with Roach’s initials and the initials RIP was found at the port. A short time later, a cage of dead rats was left outside Roach’s home. 

Despite three separate police investigations, no charges were ever brought for the threats against Roach. Marconi denied any involvement. Roach was president of the International Longshoremen’s Association and at the time he and several other longshoremen filed a whistleblower lawsuit against the state and the port. The lawsuit claimed Marconi took away their port jobs after they made their complaints about his alleged slurs.

The lawsuit ended up being dismissed when the New Hampshire Supreme Court ruled the longshoremen were contractors and not state employees. As such, they did not qualify for whistleblower protection. 

Hatz Marconi built a career as a private lawyer, becoming a shareholder at the law firm of Sheehan, Phinney, Bass and Green. Gov. Chris Sununu nominated Hantz Marconi to be Associate Supreme Court Justice in 2017. 

Now she’s on mandatory leave and, for the moment, Granite Staters continue to be left in the dark.

A Democratic lawyer who once had dreams of elected office is facing prison time for allegedly stealing money from a disabled client and then doctoring evidence.

He’s the second New Hampshire Democrat to be hit with news of potential jail time in the past 24 hours.

Police arrested Justin P. Nadeau Wednesday on charges of theft by deception, forgery, multiple counts of falsifying physical evidence, and financial exploitation of an elderly, disabled, or impaired adult.

The charges stem from information that came out during Nadeau’s ethics case before the state Professional Conduct Committee. Nadeau was ultimately disbarred after he was allegedly caught falsifying evidence during the PCC investigation.

“It’s difficult for me to imagine something worse for a lawyer to do,” one PCC member said, according to the court records.

Nadeau went before the PCC after he allegedly got a client who was impaired by a traumatic brain injury, Exeter woman Shawn Fahey, to give him close to $300,000 in loans in 2018. Nadeau allegedly secured the loans with a condo he did not own, and the anticipated proceeds from a pending defamation lawsuit he had against the Portsmouth Police Department.

Nadeau allegedly told Fahey that until the defamation lawsuit was resolved he was “strapped for cash.”

It was a tough 24 hours for New Hampshire Democrats.

Portsmouth’s Nadeau was the Democratic nominee in New Hampshire’s First Congressional District in 2004, losing to incumbent Republican Jeb Bradley by nearly 30 points. 

Nadeau’s defamation lawsuit against the Portsmouth police arose from an arrest of Portsmouth man Christian Jennings. Jennings was allegedly found with quantities of marijuana, Ecstasy, amphetamines, a loaded gun, and $42,000 in cash. According to police, Nadeau was handling an $85,000 marina investment for Jennings before the arrest, though the marina deal never closed. Nadeau brought the lawsuit when police opened an investigation into whether or not he was laundering drug money. The defamation case was settled in 2019.

Nadeau also allegedly hid the $165,000 he collected after he sent Fahey to a Massachusetts attorney to handle her injury case, according to the PCC investigation. Nadeau reportedly collected referral fees from the Massachusetts attorney as well as other money related to Fahey’s case.

Nadeau slow-walked producing documents related to the case for the PCC. The Democrat even destroyed his computer before the hearing, according to court records. Nadeau claims he made all the appropriate conflict of interest disclosures and eventually produced printed copies of the letter he claimed he sent her.

However, James Berriman, the computer expert hired by the PCC, looked through Nadeau’s office server and found the dates on the documents Nadeau gave to the committee were fake, and the documents were created well after he took the money from Fahey.

“As a member of the PCC observed at oral argument before the PCC, ‘the Berriman Report and the spoliation of evidence, in my mind . . . is one of the most significant violations I have seen in decades of practice before the ADO before joining this committee,’” a New Hampshire Supreme Court ruling states.

Nadeau appealed his disbarment, but the Supreme Court ruled in April that he crossed too many lines to be let back into court, at least not as an attorney.

Nadeau is due in Rockingham County Circuit Court in Portsmouth for an arraignment on Sept. 9.

Disgraced Democrat Jeff Woodburn is heading to jail after the New Hampshire Supreme Court rejected the appeal of his criminal mischief convictions.

The court released its decision Tuesday ruling against Woodburn’s quest for a new trial on those convictions, leaving the former state senator to serve the two 30-day sentences connected to the domestic violence case that ended his career.

“Today, the New Hampshire Supreme Court denied Jeffrey Woodburn’s motion for a new trial, leaving in place his sentence of 30 days of incarceration for his prior convictions,” New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella said in a statement. “After a lengthy and challenging legal process, this decision is consistent with our steadfast commitment to justice and our ongoing support for victims of domestic violence. We remain dedicated to upholding the law and advocating for those affected by such crimes.”

Woodburn is still free for now and his attorney, Mark Sisti, is still fighting. Sisti told NHJournal he plans to oppose any state motion to impose the sentence.

“We will be stridently objecting to any incarceration,” Sisti said.

All of the charges stemming from Woodburn’s alleged assaultive conduct against the woman were either dismisses by the state, or a jury, Sisti said. A 30-day jail sentence for criminal mischief is out of proportion to the crime, Sisti noted, especially considering Woodburn has been free on bail for five years without incident.

Woodburn isn’t the only former Democratic state legislator facing jail time. Former Nashua state Rep. Stacie Marie Laughton, 39, of Nashua, N.H., is facing federal charges of sexual exploitation of children and aiding and abetting, and state charges of child pornography. Laughton was elected three times as a Nashua Democrat, always with the endorsement of the state Democratic Party.

The legal drama surrounding Woodburn’s case has been dragging out since 2018, when the former Senate Minority Leader was first arrested for allegedly abusing his then girlfriend. He was convicted on counts of domestic violence, simple assault, and criminal mischief after his first trial in 2021, but a later Supreme Court ruling overturned the domestic violence and simple assault charges, sending them back for a second trial.

That second trial ended with a hung jury earlier this year, and Formella opted to drop the case rather than go for a third trial. All the time, Woodburn has been trying to avoid jail and get the criminal mischief counts overturned.

Woodburn wanted a new trial on the two convictions, claiming his prior defense attorney did not provide effective counsel during the 2021 trial. According to Woodburn’s appeal, his first lawyer should have severed the charges and had the criminal mischief counts before a separate jury. Having all of the counts at one trial resulted in the jury being biased against him, according to the appeal.

But the justices ruled Woodburn failed to show his original lawyer performed in a substandard way that would trigger overturning the convictions. The justices also found that the 2021 jury found Woodburn not guilty on several counts, and therefore he could not show a particular bias. 

“The strength of the evidence related to the criminal mischief charges, in combination with the jury’s multiple not guilty findings as to other related charges, indicate that it was the direct evidence of the underlying conduct, rather than any extraneous relationship information that may have been rendered admissible due to the joinder of multiple charges, that prompted the jury’s guilty findings on the criminal mischief charges,” the justices wrote. 

Amanda Grady Sexton, director of public affairs for the New Hampshire Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence, said Tuesday’s decision shows Woodburn cannot escape the convictions.

“This is a small measure of accountability for an offender who tried to avoid it at all costs. No one should think they are above the law,” Grady Sexton said. 

Woodburn lost political support almost immediately after he was charged in 2018, with Democratic Party leaders calling on him to step aside. Instead, Woodburn ran and won a primary to retain his seat in the Senate. He then lost the general election to a political unknown. Woodburn has been out of politics since.

Court records show Woodburn was planning a run for governor before he was arrested, and that he was grooming the woman to a “first lady.”

The state’s brief filed in the appeal paints a picture of Woodburn as a controlling man with a drinking problem who made his new girlfriend fear for her safety months before he was charged in 2018. According to the brief, the woman, 17 years his junior, worked as the Democratic Party chair for Coos County and helped get Woodburn elected. He started pursuing a romantic relationship with her in 2015 as his marriage was falling apart, according to the filing.

Soon after they got engaged in 2017, the state says, Woodburn began publicizing their relationship to help his political career.

“[Woodburn] posted pictures on social media and told the victim that this was ‘very important to him,’ because dating her would help him with his career,” the filing states. “Although he liked the way that the victim could ‘approach a stranger with a Bernie sticker,’ he also told her that she should ‘behave like a first lady.’ He told her that she was not to criticize  him, ‘especially in public, because he hoped to be governor.’”

A former Exeter High School student disciplined after he was falsely accused of using the wrong pronouns lost his lawsuit even though school officials lied on the stand, a judge ruled on Monday.

Rockingham Superior Court Judge Andrew Schulman quoted the band Buffalo Springfield (“There’s battle lines being drawn; Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong”) and the movie “Casablanca” in his 18-page ruling that blasts school officials for their dishonest testimony.

Exeter High School Assistant Principal Marcy Dovholuk and Football Coach William Ball both testified during last year’s bench trial that the boy was suspended from the football team because he used supposedly inappropriate language like “bozo” and “STFU” in a text conversation and not because he allegedly misgendered another student. 

“The school officials’ purported shock at plaintiff’s use of the terms ‘bozo’ and ‘stfu’ has all the believability of Captain Renault’s famous exclamation of shock in Casablanca. Context is everything,” Schulman wrote.

But the student still lost his case because New Hampshire law does not allow public institutions like schools to be held accountable for violating civil rights unless there are at least monetary damages, according to Schulman’s ruling.

“Because New Hampshire law does not recognize a private cause of action for a political subdivision’s violation of a plaintiff’s State Constitutional rights in the absence of bodily injury, property damage, personal injury or statute, the court grants judgment to the defendants,” Schulman wrote.

Attorney Richard Lehmann, who represents the student and his mother, called Schulman’s ruling a partial victory because the judge found the facts favor his client, even if the law does not.

“My clients won this case on everything but the law. The court believed their testimony and did not believe the testimony of school officials when they said that they did not take any action against my client because he expressed his beliefs,” Lehmann told NHJournal.

The boy, who has since transferred to another school, is referred to as MP in the lawsuit to protect his identity. MP and his mother were seeking $1 in nominal damages from the school for violating his free speech and religious rights. The student’s belief in only two genders is informed by science and his Catholic faith. 

Christian advocacy organization, Cornerstone, backed  MP’s lawsuit, and plans to back his appeal to the New Hampshire Supreme Court.

“Cornerstone and its attorneys look forward to appealing this decision to the New Hampshire Supreme Court—which will be bound by the trial court’s findings of fact—and to securing a ruling that will protect free speech and religious liberty for all Granite State students,” said Cornerstone’s Executive Director Shannon McGinley.

MP’s beliefs became a problem in September 2021 when he was a freshman and a member of the high school football team. While talking to friends after school on a bus, MP expressed his belief there are only two genders, according to the fact Schulman recites in his ruling. Another student, referred to as AG, took offense to that comment even though she was not part of the conversation and the comment was not directed at her, according to the ruling.

“AG formed the opinion that [MP] had the subjective  belief that there are only two genders. In fact, that is exactly what [MP] believed. He follows what he represents  to be the Catholic religious doctrine that God created human beings as male or female,” Schulman wrote. “AG believed differently and she took it upon herself to correct [MP] by saying in a loud and somewhat aggressive tone of voice that there are more than two genders.”

MP disagreed and said he believed there are openly two genders, and the conversation on the bus ended there. However, AG did not want to let it go and got MP’s cell phone number. She then restarted the argument via text later that evening, according to the ruling. 

“How are you in high school and don’t know the difference between sex and gender? Give a valid reason why ‘there’s only 2 genders,’” AG demanded via text.

AG was seeking a fight when she sent the text unprompted, and continued to argue with MP into the night, according to Schulman.

“The court pauses to consider the import of AG’s text: She intruded upon the plaintiff’s private life by sending an  uninvited and borderline hostile text to him directly. She asked a question, thereby inviting a response. She had no reason to expect that the response would be an apology indicative of cheerful agreement with her point of view. The tenor of her text did not suggest a desire for an open exchange of views. At best AG was proselytizing; at worst she was berating,” Schulman wrote.

Throughout the following text discussion, MP seems to want to end the conversation without backing down from his views, while AG continued to push her views. During the argument AG condescended to MP for his “ignorance” on gender. For his part, MP seemed to want to end the argument.

“Just STFU and leave me alone. U brought this up knowing ur wrong bozo. So grow up and maybe then you’ll realize that there are only 2 genders and sexes,” MP wrote.

But AG would not let the matter go, according to the ruling. The next day she sent an email to Ball that made false accusations MP engaged in “extreme ” transphobic bullying, according to Schulman. Neither Ball nor any other school official bothered to investigate AG’s accusations before they took action against MP, according to Schulman. Based on testimony and evidence presented at the trial, Schulman found no evidence MP engaged in any transphobic bullying.

Dovholuk and Ball decided to punish MP for his alleged transphobia, but in a way that left no paper record, according to Schulman. Instead of a formal write-up, Ball was authorized to suspend MP from the football team for up to a week.

On the witness stand, both Ball and Dovholuk claimed the punishment was for using the disrespectful terms “bozo” and “STFU,” and not for stating he believes there are two genders.

“The court does not believe the school witnesses on this point. The school witnesses are honorable people in an honorable profession, but, in the court’s view, they were dishonest about their motivations,” Schulman wrote.

Neither Ball nor Dovholuk responded to a request for comment. SAU 16 Superintendent Esther Asbell is out of the office until July 30. School Board Chair Bill Gauthier declined to comment Monday, saying he had yet to read the ruling.

With a beautiful and much younger woman by his side, a woman he instructed to act like a “first lady,” Democratic Sen. Jeff Woodburn (D-Whitefield) harbored ambitions to run for governor against incumbent Chris Sununu.

Instead, the former Senate Minority Leader is facing a possible third trial on charges he assaulted his former girlfriend while he prepares for another appeal before the New Hampshire Supreme Court. Prosecutors filed a brief last week opposing the appeal, asking the justices to uphold the only convictions still standing.

Woodburn was convicted in 2021 on two counts of criminal mischief, one count of domestic violence, and one count of simple assault for a series of incidents in which he allegedly assaulted the woman and destroyed her property. After appealing those results to the Supreme Court, the domestic violence and simple assault convictions were overturned based on the argument Woodburn wasn’t allowed to argue self-defense. But the two criminal mischief convictions were upheld.

Last month’s second trial on the domestic violence and simple assault charges in Coos Superior Court ended with a hung jury. Woodburn is free again after telling jurors he bit the woman and grabbed her in self-defense.

Now, Woodburn wants a new trial on the criminal mischief counts, claiming he didn’t get a fair trial in 2021 because his original lawyer failed to sever those charges from the assault charges.

The state’s brief paints a picture of Woodburn as a controlling man with a drinking problem who made his new girlfriend fear for her safety months before he was charged in 2018. According to the brief, the woman, 17 years his junior, worked as the Democratic Party chair for Coos County and helped get Woodburn elected. He started pursuing a romantic relationship with her in 2015 as his marriage was falling apart, according to the filing.

Soon after they got engaged in 2017, the state says, Woodburn began publicizing their relationship to help his political career.

“(Woodburn) posted pictures on social media and told the victim that this was ‘very important to him,’ because dating her would help him with his career,” the filing states. “Although he liked the way that the victim could ‘approach a stranger with a Bernie sticker,’ he also told her that she should ‘behave like a first lady.’ He told her that she was not to criticize  him, ‘especially in public, because he hoped to be governor.’”

The relationship was described as “volatile,” with Woodburn losing his temper and yelling at her or kicking the door off her clothes dryer during an argument, the state says. The woman told a friend she didn’t call the police after those incidents because she felt she was at fault, and she didn’t want to get Woodburn in trouble.

According to the available record, things got violent in late 2017. After a Dec. 16, 2017, Christmas party, an intoxicated Woodburn bit the woman’s hand, leaving marks. The bite came when the woman tried to take Woodburn’s phone during the argument.

Days later, on Christmas Eve, Woodburn allegedly punched her in the stomach after he had been drinking and verbally berating her while they wrapped presents for her children. After taking half a bottle of vodka and food, Woodburn left the house, according to the filing. However, he was back a short time later, breaking into the house and yelling at the woman.

“I hate you so much; why do we do this?” Woodburn reportedly said.

The woman testified she kept blaming herself for Woodburn’s outbursts and violence and, at the same time, was too scared to get help.

“At that point, I feared what he would do to me, too. I feared what would happen to me, that he would retaliate. He knew all the police officers in the town, too,” the woman said.

In June 2018, Woodburn became intoxicated during a party and again assaulted the woman during an argument on the ride home, according to the filing, leaving bruises on her arm. Soon after that incident, they broke up as a couple, and she contacted law enforcement.

Woodburn’s lawyer, Mark Sisti, previously told NHJournal he plans to fight “tooth and nail” to clear his client.

New Hampshire’s Supreme Court ruled this week that Granite State courts have seen enough of Portsmouth attorney Justin Nadeau, disbarring him after he was caught doctoring evidence in his ethics case before the Professional Conduct Committee.

“It’s difficult for me to imagine something worse for a lawyer to do,” one PCC member said, according to the court records.

Nadeau, once a Democratic candidate in the First Congressional District, was brought before the PCC after he allegedly got a client who was impaired by a traumatic brain injury, Exeter woman Shawn Fahey, to give him $300,000 in loans in 2018. Nadeau allegedly secured the loans with a condo he did not own, tax liens, and the anticipated proceeds from a pending defamation lawsuit he had against the Portsmouth Police Department.

Nadeau allegedly told Fahey until the defamation lawsuit was resolved he was “strapped for cash.”

The lawsuit against Portsmouth’s police stems from an arrest of Portsmouth man Christian Jennings. Jennings was allegedly found with quantities of marijuana, Ecstasy, amphetamines, a loaded gun, and $42,000 in cash. According to police, Nadeau was handling an $85,000 marina investment for Jennings before the arrest, though the marina deal never closed. Nadeau brought the lawsuit when police opened an investigation into whether or not he was laundering drug money. The defamation case was settled in 2019.

Nadeau also allegedly hid the $165,000 he collected after he sent Fahey to a Massachusetts attorney to handle her injury case. Nadeau reportedly collected referral fees from the Massachusetts attorney as well as other money related to Fahey’s case.

According to the Supreme Court’s disbarment order released Tuesday, Nadeau slow-walked producing documents related to the case to the PCC. The Democrat even destroyed his computer before the hearing. Nadeau claims he made all the appropriate conflict of interest disclosures and eventually produced printed copies of the letter he claimed he sent her.

However, James Berriman, the computer expert hired by the PCC, looked through Nadeau’s office server and found the dates on the documents Nadeau gave to the committee were fake, and the documents were created well after he took the money from Fahey.

“As a member of the PCC observed at oral argument before the PCC, ‘the Berriman Report and the spoliation of evidence, in my mind . . . is one of the most significant violations I have seen in decades of practice before the ADO before joining this committee,’” the court ruling states.

Nadeau argued that disbarment is too harsh a penalty, but the Court found that his “deliberate, multi-year effort to deceive the disciplinary authority” and the ethics complaints involved in Fahey’s case make un-lawyering him appropriate.

Nadeau’s father, J.P. Nadeau, agreed to resign from the New Hampshire Bar Association in 2009 after he was investigated for a conflict of interest for representing a construction company involved in a dispute with Justin Nadeau.

Nadeau once had hopes of higher office, running an ultimately unsuccessful campaign against then-Congressman Jeb Bradley (R). Nadeau’s campaign was spearheaded by Steve Marchand, Portsmouth’s former mayor who ,himself went on to unsuccessful runs for higher office. In recent years, Marchand has been warned by the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office for skirting campaign laws.

According to his attorney, jurors should be ordered to consider biting as self-defense when they deliberate the simple assault and domestic abuse charges against Jeffrey Woodburn.

The disgraced Democratic former state Senate Minority Leader is gearing up for his second trial on allegations he assaulted his former girlfriend on multiple occasions. His arrest six years ago resulted in a trial, conviction, and multiple appeals — not to mention the end of his political career. 

Woodburn continues to fight the charges.

The Coos County Democrat was convicted in 2022, but the state Supreme Court tossed those convictions last year because he was originally barred from making the case he acted in self-defense. That sent the case back to Coos Superior Court for a new trial.

Woodburn’s attorney, Mark Sisti, filed his version of proposed jury instructions ahead of the sequel trial slated to start next week. The jury instructions make it clear Woodburn will try to justify his use of physical violence against his former girlfriend.

“A person has the right to utilize non-deadly force when he can reasonably believe that such force is necessary in order to defend himself. In this case, Jeffrey Woodburn asserts that his act of physical contact, including biting the alleged victim, was necessary as he reasonably believed that the complainant posed an imminent threat of restraining him from exiting the car,” according to the Woodburn defense documents.

According to court records, Woodburn bit the woman during a December 2017 argument as she was driving him back from a party. An intoxicated Woodburn demanded to be let out of the car, and he planned to call a friend for a ride. When the woman reached to take his phone, he allegedly bit her hand, according to the allegations.

While Woodburn was not able to cast blame on the victim at his original trial, the Supreme Court’s ruling means he can now claim the woman’s past aggressiveness when dealing with him, usually when he was intoxicated, to justify his actions. 

According to the proposed jury instructions, Woodburn will argue he was acting out of the “heat of passion” and shouldn’t be judged with hindsight.

“In deciding whether the defendant acted in self-defense, you should consider all of the circumstances surrounding the incident. You should consider how the defendant acted under the circumstances as they were presented to him at the time and not necessarily as they appear upon detached reflection. You should consider whether the defendant’s belief that it was necessary to use non-deadly force was reasonable when he acted in the heat of passion,” the proposed instructions state.

It will ultimately be up to a jury to decide if Woodburn’s self-defense claims are enough to keep him from consequences. His related convictions on charges of criminal mischief were upheld on appeal, but Woodburn has yet to serve any jail time as the 30-day sentences were stayed pending the new trial.

According to court records, Woodburn kicked the door to the woman’s house and she refused to let him inside about a week after the fight in the car. Earlier that year, in August 2017, he reportedly kicked her clothes dryer, breaking the appliance, according to court records.

Woodburn’s tenacity in fighting the charges is similar to his scramble to stay in politics after his arrest in the summer of 2018. Despite calls from state Democrats to resign, Woodburn ran for reelection and won the primary in September 2018. He went on to lose the general election that November.

Kathy Bossi doesn’t think refusing to wear a face mask at a public meeting is a crime. But New Hampshire’s Supreme Court upheld her trespassing conviction anyway.

The Kingston grandmother and Sunday school teacher lost her appeal when the state Supreme Court ruled late last week that she was, in fact, guilty of trespass at a school board meeting when she protested a mask mandate.

Bossi was arrested at a May 2021 Timberlane Regional School Board meeting when she refused to put on a surgical face mask, which the school required as part of its response to the COVID-19 pandemic raging at the time.

Mask mandates became a cultural hot button as parents across the country responded with protests. The video of police officers pulling the handcuffed Bossi out of the Timberlane High School auditorium went viral.

In her appeal, Bossi argued refusing to wear a mask isn’t a crime, and she cannot be criminally charged for not being masked. The court ruled, however, that Bossi was convicted for entering a space without privilege or license and not for mask refusal.

“The defendant also argues that the case should have been dismissed because ‘[r]efusing to wear a surgical mask as a condition for attending a public meeting at Timberlane Regional School Board is not a crime.’ The school board did condition the license or privilege to enter the auditorium on wearing a mask, and it authorized the Plaistow Police Department to enforce the policy. Because the defendant entered the auditorium without license or privilege, she was arrested for criminal trespass,” the court ruled.

Bossi was part of a group of Timberlane parents protesting the district’s in-school masking policy. When she refused to put on a mask in order to get into the auditorium, she was arrested.

“You are violating my rights right now,” Bossi told police in the video. “Are you seriously doing this, you guys?”

School Board Chair Katie Knutsen did not respond to NHJournal’s request for comment.

The school district had enacted a policy that everyone entering school buildings was required to wear face masks, including the auditorium where board meetings were held. The school board posted signs outside the meeting that said face masks were required, and the face mask requirement was noticed in the meeting agenda. 

Bossi and a few other protesters pushed past police officers with signs to get into the auditorium before they were stopped. According to court records, officers had spoken to Bossi and the mask requirement and told her she could not enter the meeting without a mask. 

Bossi reportedly told police she was going to get into the auditorium without a mask, and they could not stop her. While she did manage to get into the meeting, she was soon arrested. Bossi reportedly refused to give police her name when she was first taken into custody.

The in-person meeting was canceled shortly after Bossi’s arrest, and the board met via Zoom.

Bossi was convicted on the misdemeanor criminal trespassing charge in Salem District Court. One count of disorderly conduct was conditionally dismissed until Bossi’s appeal was heard and decided. 

Bossi represented herself in the appeal and argued that refusing to comply with a mask mandate does not rise to the level of being a crime and that she had every right to be in the public building during a public meeting.

Bossi did not respond to NHJournal’s request for comment.

Part of Bossi’s argument rests on her theory that police officers did not have the right to enforce a mask mandate. However, the court found police were at the meeting by request of the school board. The board was concerned about anti-mask protesters causing a disturbance and asked officers to keep the peace.

Public health authorities, including former White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci, have since acknowledged a lack of data supporting mask mandates as an effective response to the pandemic. 

Earlier this month, Fauci admitted the six-foot rule used to keep classrooms closed during the pandemic was not based on science or data but rather “sort of just appeared.”

Granite State taxpayers have broken the $20,000 barrier on school spending, even as K-12 academic performance remains flat and school enrollment declines.

“Last week, the New Hampshire Department of Education released its newest cost per pupil data for the 2022-2023 school year,” the department said in a press release. “The new statewide average operating cost per pupil of $20,323 is a 4.8 percent increase from last year’s average cost per pupil of $19,400. Total expenditures for the 2022-2023 school year were more than $3.8 billion in New Hampshire.”

To put the $20,323 in perspective, tuition to attend Bishop Guertin High School, a highly-ranked private Catholic school in Nashua, is $16,400. Mount Royal Academy is the highest-ranked Catholic school in the state. High school tuition is $10,700.

New Hampshire also spends far more per pupil than most of the nation. Across the U.S., the average cost per pupil is shy of $14,295, putting New Hampshire in the top 10 nationally for education spending. And as state Education Commissioner Frank Edelblut told NHJournal, taxpayer spending on public schools has been soaring for more than a decade.

“The statewide average for New Hampshire’s cost per pupil has increased by nearly 87 percent since 2000 when it cost less than $11,000 per student. During this same time frame, public school enrollment has dropped by about 20 percent statewide,” Edelblut said.

According to Edelblut, student enrollment numbers in the Granite State have dropped from 207,684 in 2002 to 165,095 in 2023. That’s a decrease of 42,589 public school students, or about a 20.5 percent decline during the past 21 years.

Despite the massive increase in spending, Granite State students are struggling on achievement tests like the SAT. House Education Committee vice chair Rep. Glenn Cordelli (R-Tuftonboro) said it’s time to pay attention to the poor return on investment.

“It’s pretty evident that over probably a couple of decades, spending is going up, and achievement scores are pretty much flat,” Cordelli said.

New Hampshire’s 2023 SAT scores dropped off slightly again. The junior class scored 35 percent proficient in math compared to 37 percent in 2022 and 42 percent in 2021. Students also lost ground on reading proficiency in 2023, with 60 percent proficiency compared to 61 percent proficiency in 2022 and 63 percent proficiency in 2021.

Edelblut said the increasing cost per pupil is partly due to increasing costs, and partly due to the steady drop in the number of students. 

“While we have and will continue to work to expand resources for all students, it is clear that we are in a challenging environment of escalating costs and decreasing student enrollment,” Edelblut said. 

Some school districts manage to come in under the new average, with Manchester at $16,636, Nashua spending $18,107, and Bedford at $17,418. Concord is spending $22,190 per pupil, and New Hampshire’s highest cost per pupil is New Castle at $41,754, a little more than the $41,650 tuition at The Derryfield School, an exclusive private day school in Manchester.

The record spending for public school students comes as the legislature is being pressed to find a way to change the way public education is funded. New Hampshire relies largely on local property taxes to fund public education, with the state sending an adequacy grant to districts that average $4,100 per pupil.

The district responsible for New Hampshire’s current school funding scheme thanks to lawsuits in the 1980s and 1990s, Claremont, is spending almost $22,000 per pupil. The Contoocook Valley Regional School District, behind a lawsuit that could change New Hampshire’s funding system again, is spending more than $25,000 per pupil.

The recent decision in the ConVal lawsuit has the state under court order to increase the adequacy aid grant to at least $7,300. Cordelli said that increase puts New Hampshire on the path to an income tax. The ConVal decision is stayed as the state appeals to the New Hampshire Supreme Court, giving the legislature time to find another funding plan.

Parents and homeowners frustrated with high property taxes and poor achievement are going to demand changes, Cordelli said.

“At some point, the public is going to become aware, and something is going to happen,” Cordelli said.

Parents are already finding lower cost, and sometimes better quality, opportunities outside the public school system. Kate Baker Demers, executive director of Children’s Scholarship Fund New Hampshire, said the average Education Freedom Account grant in New Hampshire is $5,255, about a quarter of the new cost per pupil for public school students.

“So, if a parent taxpayer is concerned about the high spending and cost, they could choose an EFA and save the state $14,745 per child. Which is, what, the amount that other states spend in total?” Baker Demers said.

This school year, EFA enrollment went up 20 percent to 4,211 students in New Hampshire. Of that total, 1,577 are new to the program. Taxpayers are now paying a little more than $22 million for EFA grants.

Disgraced former State Sen. Jeffrey Woodburn is not being allowed to introduce evidence that he claims shows the alleged victim had a history of causing the kind of fights that led to his alleged crimes.

Woodburn, once one of the highest-ranking elected Democrats in state government, continues to fight hard against the domestic violence charges that have hung over him since his 2018 arrest. He is heading for a new trial on one count of domestic violence and one count of simple assault after the New Hampshire Supreme Court ruled he was denied the ability to argue self-defense.

On Friday, Coos Superior Court Judge Peter Bornstein denied Woodburn’s request to introduce evidence of prior instances that “physically interfered with his attempts to avoid conflict.”

Woodburn’s attorney, Mark Sisti, filed a motion to allow this evidence, even though it detailed incidents that predate the alleged violence for which he had originally been convicted. 

“Testimony concerning Jeff Woodburn’s prior attempts to avoid conflict and the alleged victim’s behavior about those attempts are admissible and relevant to his mental state at the time of this alleged offense,” Sisti wrote.

Assistant Attorney General Zachary Wolfe’s objection pointed out Sisti and Woodburn supply no details about this “vague, amorphous” evidence, making it impossible to counter in court or even prove they actually happened.

“The defendant’s motion fails to identify not only the specific instances of conduct he wishes to introduce, but also any specific legal grounds justifying his request,” Wolfe wrote.

While the Supreme Court ruled Woodburn can use evidence demonstrating his claim of self-defense for the actions covered in the trial, Bornstein wrote in his order that it does not open the door for what is essentially the unspecified evidence Woodburn is claiming.

“Among other things, the defendant has not identified any of the alleged victim’s prior acts as to which he seeks to introduce evidence or the approximate date(s) on which he alleges occurred,” Bornstein wrote. 

The simple assault and domestic violence convictions stem from Woodburn’s violent actions related to three separate incidents, according to court records. In the first instance, Woodburn and the woman arrived in separate vehicles at a Dec. 15, 2017, Christmas party, and the woman agreed to drive him home so that Woodburn could drink at the party. During an argument on the drive home, Woodburn had the woman pull over, and during a struggle over his phone, he bit her hand, according to court records.

On Christmas Eve that same year, Woodburn kicked the door to the woman’s house when she refused to let him inside. In August 2017, he reportedly kicked her clothes dryer earlier that year, breaking the appliance, according to court records.

The woman went on record telling Bornstein that at one point during one of her struggles with Woodburn, she tried to grab his phone without permission. Bornstein stated in court that it did not rise to the level of behavior allowing Woodburn’s self-defense claims.

Woodburn’s new trial on the two charges is slated for next year. The North Country Democrat has already been convicted on two counts of criminal mischief and is facing 30 days in jail. He is also free while he appeals Bornstein’s August ruling denying a new trial on these charges.

Woodburn is just one of several Granite State Democrats embroiled in legal scandals. Strafford County Sheriff Mark Brave is on paid leave and facing charges of stealing tax dollars to pay for trysts with a series of paramours. Former state Rep. Stacie Laughton (D-Nashua) is in jail awaiting trial on child pornography charges. And two-time Democratic candidate for governor, former Portsmouth Mayor Steve Marchand, has just been called out for a second time by the state attorney general over illegal campaign tactics he used in local political races.

In addition, both U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan (D) and the state Democratic Party are still holding on to cash donated to them by notorious fraudster Sam Bankman-Fried after he allegedly stole it from clients. Hassan and the NHDP were two of the top recipients of the more than $100 million in political campaign contributions federal prosecutors say Bankman-Fried made before the 2022 midterm elections.