Is Joe Kelly Levasseur the Biggest Leaker of Confidential Info in Manchester, New Hampshire?
Alderman at Large Planted Story About His TV Co-Host Will Infantine — OPINION
MANCHESTER, NH — I have already stated my opinion that Alderman at Large Joseph Kelly Levasseur is The Biggest Asshole in The Queen City. It’s my belief that Joe Levasseur ranks as the most foul and contemptible politician to ever serve in elected office in the history of New Hampshire’s largest metropolis.
But what do I know? I do know that Levasseur was a source of confidential information multiple time, presented to me in the hopes that I would publish it. Some of the stories he gave me I did publish.
One story was about his public access TV co-host Will Infantine allegedly (the alleging being done by the Joe of The Wil & Joe Show) sleeping with the bride before a wedding in which Infantine was the best man. The story was confirmed by multiple sources, so I published it.
Levasseur himself, sitting in his old downtown law office, gave me advice on how to write articles so as not to violate libel, slander and defamation laws.
Infantine and Levasseur ran as a team in 2011, when both sought the alderman at large position. They intended to do so again in 2013, but Levasseur’s constant conflicts with Mayor Ted Gatsas and his hassling of the Manchester Police Department led to him becoming the odd man out.
There were three Republicans in the four-person field for alderman at large in 2013 — Levasseur, Infantine, and S. Daniel Mattingly — facing off against Democrat Daniel P. O’Neil in the nonpartisan election.
Infantine had been the chair of the City party, but stepped down and Tammy Simmons was named interim chair. Under Simmons, whose ex-husband had retained Levasseur as her attorney in their divorce case, the City GOP decided that it would not support candidates who were team players. The head of that team was Ted Gatas, and since Joe was on the outs with Gatsas, the Party was on the outs with Levasseur.
Amd Levasseur blamed Will Infantine, who left the first incarnation of The Will and Joe Show, which was produced by Joe Kelly Levasseur.
And I unwittingly became a cat’s paw in the political Will & Joe road show.
Multiple Sources
Later on, I came to find out that the source of the Will Infantine story for my other sources was: Joe Kelly Levasseur.
When Will Infantine and Joe Kelly Levasseur made a rapprochement after several years, and Infantine began to appear on Levasseur’s show again, I sent him a private letter by mail. I told him that Levasseur was the source of the story I published in my article.
I also told Infantine that Levasseur, after the story was published, asked me to write an anonymous “poison pen” letter to Infantine’s wife, to include a printout of the story.
I never considered sending such a letter.
Imagine my surprise when I turned into Levasseur’s public access TV show and Will Infantine had the letter in his hands and was talking about it, with a gurning Joe next to him. Infantine told me to give him a call, so I did.
On he phone, Infantine explained what had happened as regards the wedding party, and it was not quite the story that Levasseur had told me — similar, but the part meant to hurt Infantine and put him in a bad light was not true.
I apologized for not checking with him before publishing the article. He did tell me he knew Joe well, and that my concern about Levasseur and his mercurial personality had some validity.
At times since I wondered how Will Infantine could continue to appear on public TV with Joe Levasseur (he now is running with Joe an electoral team as they had intended to do back in 2013). Of course, since the kicker of the story was wrong, he likely did not hold it against Joe in the way anyone would have if it had been true….Although if anyone had spread such a story about me, true or not, I would not have anything to with them again.
Politics makes strange bedfellows.
But still, Levasseur is someone I learned — the hard way — not to trust. He is the single most unethical human being I have ever met.
Levasseur the Leaker
That Joe Kelly Levasseur is a liar can be construed from the 2014 report of the New Hampshire Attorney General, looking into the validity of his charges against Manchester Police Chief David Mara and another police officer.
The report says that it was delayed due to constant stonewalling by Levasseur. In the end, it concluded that Levasseur’s charges were unfounded. There was no validity to them.
Many people have characterizes the A.G. Report’s conclusions as saying that Joe Kelly Levasseur was, in essence, a liar.
The local press knows JKL as the #1 leaker of confidential information, and as a person who shops around compromising and even salacious information to individual journalists.
When I mentioned to one journalist how Levasseur once tried to give me a story about Mayor Ted Gatsas covering up alleged wrongdoing by a department head, the journalist laughed.
That’s where I got the phrase “shop around.”
The journalist laughed and said to me, “Joe was shopping that story around to all the media outlets.”
Remember this —Alderman at Large Joe Kelly Levasseur, Esq., a member of the New Hampshire Bar, defended then-Mayor Ted Gatsas from what was undeniably true, that he had covered up a high school rape. This is the Joseph Kelly Levasseur who told me and other journalists of how Mayor Ted Gatsas had covered up what he alleged was wrongdoing by a department head.
Yes, Alderman Joe Kelly Levasseur is not only biggest asshole in Manchester, but as I have said previously, Joe Kelly Levasseur is the single most unethical human being I have ever met in my life. He has no business being an elected official, in my opinion.
What I have heard over and over again, since I found myself up to my neck in the swamp of Manchester municipal politics since 2013, if the surprise of people that Joseph Kelly Levasseur, Attorney at Law, hasn’t been disbarred.
(To be continued….)
