 POOR JUDGMENT? Williams. |
Attention all real housewives of New Jersey, Atlanta, and Orange County, Jon, Kate and all Kardashians and Biggest Losers: your lunch has just been taken. That’s right, when it comes to bizarro reality world excitement, you just can’t touch the Biggest Little.
Proof positive that if one were able to point a television camera on the world of Vo Dilun and air the results, we’d smother the competition, came on Page 1 of Tuesday’s BeloJo in a story by ace Other Paper scribe Bill Malinowski.
The story referenced a hearing held on Monday in Family Court in the divorce case of Pamela J. DosReis and Frank J. DosReis. Ordinarily this would be of little interest to the general public except for the fact that the former chief justice of the Rhode Island Supreme Court Frank J. Williams plays more than a cameo role in the court filings.
Pamela DosReis, a deputy state sheriff, served as Justice Williams’s driver for a number of years. The filings reveal that Justice Williams had his own bedroom in (and a key to) the DosReis household, dined there and stayed overnight regularly (according to Mr. DosReis, the judge would visit their home “at least five times a week”) and, at one point, accompanied Mr. & Mrs. DosReis and their young daughter to Disney World. Williams also paid the daughter’s school tuition ($6500), created a trust for her ($6000), and bought the family a television set ($1000) and new tires for Mr. DosReis’s truck.
Thank you, Uncle Moneybags! But, whoops, Mr. DosReis is uneasy about the dynamic between his six-year-old daughter and the judge. Perhaps he thought it weird when Williams accompanied DosReis and his daughter to the kindergarten “Father-Daughter” dance in West Warwick. Or maybe (as Mr. DosReis testified) it’s because Judge Williams “watched her while she bathed in the tub.”
It may look bad, but there is hope for Justice Williams. That’s because Mr. DosReis is being represented in court by Williams’s arch-enemy (and another certified member of the Vo Dilun Bizarro Hall of Fame), Keven McKenna (aka Kenny McKeven). With this kind of star power, how can those other reality shows ever hope to compete?
So what’ll it be: Lincoln scholar or world class weirdo? In an attempt to counter any suggestion that his behavior might be considered a bit “off,” Williams has retained the venerable Vo Dilun public relations firm the RDW Group and spokesman Mike Doyle, who told the Urinal that the whole thing is a Kenny McKeven revenge plot and vendetta: “This is part and parcel of a pattern. The chief justice and his wife took a personal interest in a young woman. They are profoundly saddened by the entry of Keven McKenna and his vitriolic comments. There is nothing unseemly or untoward about anything they did.”
While P&J are uncertain how the evil McKeven was able to get the DosReises to divorce in order to further his dastardly plot against Williams (or what the role of Mrs. Williams is, as she only seems to appear in Doyle’s scenario), we would have to say that there are a few head-scratching elements to the story as told in court and in the BeloJo. Nice spin but no cigar, Mike.
And one last tip of the sombrero to Malinowski. We loved the second to last paragraph in the story: “DosReis also testified Monday that Williams would drop off his garbage each Sunday night for pickup in Johnston. There is no public garbage pickup in Richmond where Williams lives.”
Say tuned, folks. This one’s so ready for prime time we’ll bet Dick Wolf is taking noted for future Law & Order episodes. Unfortunately, he could never duplicate the double-barreled genius of Williams and McKenna.
BECK AND CALL
P&J are wondering why Governor Don “Laughing Boy” Carcieri would have been seen yukking it up at Borders last week with right-wing loony radio and TV personality Glenn Beck, who was conducting a book signing there? At least three people (including two Borders employees) confirm-ed the Governor’s presence at the store (guess the BeloJo had already split or didn’t find the Governor going to meet Beck of any interest). We do not know, however, whether Laughing Boy bought a book and had it signed, offered him a special gubernatorial proclamation, or just wanted to show up to offer his support for Beck’s mad dog musings.
SENDING JEN TO WASHINGTON
P&J alluded to this event about a month ago but it’s time for you liberals and progressives to order tickets to the big Jennifer Lawless tribute being put on by the Women’s Fund of Rhode Island. The date is October 22, the place, the Radisson (Airport) Hotel in Warwick, and the time is 6 pm for the cash bar and 7 pm for dinner. For reservations and more information, you can call Olivia Rodrigues at the Women’s Fund at 401.274.4564 x 4176.
Jen is, of course, the Brown University political science professor who, after penning a book on the dearth of women in elective politics, took the plunge and ran a spirited US Congressional primary campaign against popular incumbent Jim Langevin. It was a gutsy move and an energetic campaign and many believe it prodded Representative Langevin to take a more progressive stance on a number of issues.
In case you hadn’t heard, Jen has gone to Washington to take over as the director of the Women & Politics Institute at American University, where she is also an associate professor of government, one of those gigs you just can’t turn down despite the fact that there will be no local restaurants serving coffee milk in the vicinity.
And, while we did refer to this as a “tribute,” this may not be too accurate as P&J have been asked to “say a few words.”
THE CARLIN LINE, REDUX
In this space last week, we talked about Jenny Slate’s use of the F-word on Saturday Night Live and how it conjured memories of Charlie Rocket’s crossing of the Carlin Line by saying the same “dirty word” on SNL nearly three decades prior. That offense led our pal to being cashiered by NBC management. In our item we pointed out that Rocket (nee Claverie) had also worked as an anchorman at WPRI-TV after his graduation from RISD (despite his proud claim to have read but one book in his life), before heading to fame and fortune in New York and LA.
We bring this up since, unbeknownst to us as we were writing our piece, another former Channel 12 anchor, Ernie Anastos (1976-78), now at Fox News Channel 5 in New York City, was embarrassing himself by saying “Keep fucking that chicken” to his weatherman in a happy news-style repartee gaffe, which absolutely shocked his co-anchor Dari Alexander. It is all over YouTube if you care to enjoy the spectacle.
P+J wonder what causes people with Channel 12 affiliations to commit such faux pas in public? We can mention another incident along these lines in Vo Dilun media lore, when then-Channel 12 general manager Bob Rice told innocent and enthusiastic journalism students at a URI forum that Phillipe moderated, “Our viewers are dumb as shit,” which left them open-mouthed and in shock (as P. and other media panelists covered up their snorts of laughter with fake coughs and sneezes).
Perhaps it is this mysterious strain of conscious Tourrette’s which led WPRI to team up with Fox News. But we hope for the amusement of ourselves and the general public that we see someone as demure as weathergirl Michelle Mouseketeero coming out with a comment like “Stick to the fucking news beat, Adams” when throwing it back to her colleague Karen on the evening news in the near future.
