State Police release additional 38 Studios records
By: Rebecca Turco
Email: rturco@abc6.com
PROVIDENCE, R.I. – State Police released additional records Wednesday from its criminal investigation of 38 Studios.
Police released non-privileged, non-grand jury audio files of interviews conducted with 50 people. The transcripts had previously been released, but the audio files took longer to post due to technical processing of the files, explained Director of Public Information Laura Meade Kirk.
Also released were 78 pages of emails that had been previously sealed from the public by a court order that has since been lifted.
The emails span more than two years, from April 2013 to November 2015. The majority of the emails detail officials’ efforts to set up interview with key players of the failed video game company, including founder Curt Schilling.
In one email, dated April 2015, Schilling tells his lawyer, Edward Hayes, he has “zero desire” to return to Rhode Island. Appearing to reference a negative business climate in the state, Schilling writes: “Never thought an ounce of what I had heard was true until I actually tried to run a business there, then was blown away by the fact that almost everything I was told was in fact true.”
Hayes later wrote to the assistant attorney general following an interview in June 2015, saying he hoped the meeting was informative and that there would not be need for further questioning: “As we discussed, while the state does not seem to think so, Mr. Schilling has been enough of a victim in this mess.”
The audio recordings released include then-Governor Donald Carcieri, who served as the ex officio chairman of the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation (EDC). Despite that role, he claimed he was not privy to all of the negotiations. “I know that there were discussions going on,” he said in a police phone interview from February 2014, “There were a lot of negotiations all around the closing of the deal. I was not a party to any of those.”
Another key interview was then-House Finance Chair Steven Costantino, who said the EDC may not have been so forthcoming to general assembly members about its negotiations. “In hindsight, EDC was further along than I think they probably let us know,” Costantino told police over the phone in June 2014.
The EDC officially struck the $75-million deal in 2010. When the company failed, taxpayers were left to pay $88-million in moral obligation bonds. That total diminished to $61-million following court settlements.
In September 2015, State Police released tens of thousands of previously sealed documents, then released hundreds of pages more in June 2017.
No criminal charges were filed as a result of the years-long investigation.
In a statement, Governor Gina Raimondo called Wednesday’s release of additional records: “[A]nother valuable step toward achieving transparency for Rhode Islanders. We deserve to know what happened in this case, and I will continue to fight for the release of all grand jury documents.”
Meanwhile, Attorney General Peter Kilmartin maintains his stance on keeping those documents sealed. “The Attorney General’s position on the sanctity of the grand jury process remains the same,” a spokesperson said in a statement. “In May, the Presiding Justice of the Superior Court agreed with the Attorney General finding that ‘allowing public clamor alone to justify disclosure would cause the exception’ for the release of grand jury materials ‘to swallow the rule’ and would ‘entirely defeat the purpose, and role, of the grand jury.’”
The case is pending on appeal to the Rhode Island Supreme Court.
© WLNE-TV 2017
