By NANCY WEST, InDepthNH.org

James Fernald says former Ports Director Geno Marconi and his wife, retired Supreme Court Justice Anna Barbara Hantz Marconi, were the victims of malicious prosecution because Marconi’s bosses on the Pease Development Authority board of directors broke the same law he pleaded guilty to for making public some confidential motor vehicle records.

In the highly publicized criminal cases, Geno Marconi, 74, of Stratham, pleaded guilty Oct. 31, 2025, to one misdemeanor count of providing confidential motor vehicle records pertaining to Neil Levesque, vice chairman of the Pease Development Authority, to Brad Cook, who was then chairman of the Division of Ports and Harbors Advisory Council.

Fernald, a friend of Geno Marconi’s, filed a complaint with the Attorney General’s public integrity unit against the PDA board Tuesday claiming members should be charged with the same crime as Geno Marconi. Fernald, an engineer who lives in Portsmouth, wants the board to resign and seeks protection for himself for filing a whistleblower’s complaint.

Fernald said there are a total of six automobile and boat registrations from three individuals published in documents on the PDA website that were knowingly disclosed to the general public by the PDA and its board of directors without authorization between June 2024 and 2025. 

“I found it odd that director Marconi was charged with a misdemeanor for mishandling motor vehicle records when the PDA and board of directors had in fact done the same thing after Mr. Marconi was suspended,” Fernald said in a phone interview after the PDA’s regular meeting Tuesday.

“I believe it’s an injustice to charge someone with an offense, have him plead guilty to it when his bosses were essentially doing the same thing. It’s preferential treatment and discriminatory prosecution,” Fernald said, adding it’s “malicious prosecution.”

Steve Duprey, Chair, on behalf of the PDA Board of Directors, said he wasn’t concerned about Fernald’s complaint, but will fully cooperate with any Attorney General inquiry.

“I am confident that if there were any inadvertent disclosure mistakes by the PDA, the Attorney General will conclude that these are substantially different from the intentional, criminal activities of the former Ports Director and by advisory committee member Brad Cook, who both pled guilty to committing crimes.

“In the former instance, the information disclosed was done so voluntarily by applicants for mooring permits. In the case of former Port Director Marconi and former advisory committee member, Brad Cook, the disclosures were made without permission, for no valid purpose other than to allegedly harass a director of the PDA, who was raising important and legitimate questions about practices at Rye Harbor,” Duprey wrote.

Brad Cook, 75, of Hampton, responded Wednesday evening saying he wanted the documents on Neil Levesque’s commercial fisherman’s license and the motor vehicle record that got him and Marconi in trouble was part of the packet by accident.

Cook said he wanted to show that as a part-time commercial lobster fisherman Levesque shouldn’t be voting on related issues on the PDA board, that it would be a conflict of interest.

Cook said after the Attorney General’s Office investigated Geno Marconi for two years, including empaneling a grand jury and digging through his financial records, “that’s all they could find against him,” Cook said referring to Marconi.

Levesque said: “Brad Cook plead guilty to criminal charges last Fall. We have been cleaning up the criminal activity that has gone at the Ports. The bad guys don’t like it.”

Before he was indicted, Cook, who formerly owned Atlantic Fishing and Whale Watching in Rye, told InDepthNH.org, that he believed then-Gov. Chris Sununu was behind the effort to get rid of Geno Marconi because Marconi didn’t agree with the state’s plan to build a controversial elevated strip mall in the Rye Harbor parking lot, but preferred that money be used for other infrastructure improvements such as the seawall, parking lot improvements and pier maintenance.

Before all three criminal cases were resolved in plea agreements, Sununu, Attorney General John Formella, Duprey and five judges, including Supreme Court Chief Justice Gordon MacDonald, had been called to testify at Justice Hantz Marconi’s trial. She ultimately pleaded no contest to meeting with Sununu about the investigation into her husband, was found guilty, fined $1,200, allowed to return to the bench and retired a few months later as required when she turned 70.

Geno Marconi pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of Driver Privacy Act Violation, a misdemeanor on Oct. 31, 2025. He was fined $2,000, received a 30-day suspended sentence and was required to immediately resign from his position.

Cook pleaded guilty and was fined $1,200. Cook also made a separate complaint at Tuesday’s PDA meeting but was cut off after the three-minute limit during the public comment portion of the meeting. He said he will finish his complaint at next month’s meeting.

Fernald outlined his Attorney General public integrity complaint to the PDA board during the public comment portion Tuesday.

“This morning I filed a complaint with the Public Integrity Unit for the State of NH Criminal Justice Bureau in the Office of the Attorney General.  Given their ferocity in pursuing motor vehicle record mishandling, I’m sure you will be hearing from them.  I hope you enjoy the taxpayer funded colonoscopy you are about to receive from the investigators in the AGs office. 

“Lastly, the PDA and the entire Board have taken discriminatory actions against both its employees and its customers.  This certainly appears to be an organized criminal conspiracy,” Fernald told the board.

Fernald said all members of the board should be criminally charged and resign their seats.

Michael Garrity, spokesman for Attorney General Formella, said: “At this time, we would neither confirm nor deny any potential New Hampshire Department of Justice Public Integrity Unit matter responsive to your request, as to answer otherwise could reasonably be expected to constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy pursuant to RSA 91-A:5, IV. See Order Welford v. State of New Hampshire, Division of State Police, 217-2016-CV-00282 (2016).”