Jan. 14—Attorneys for indicted state Supreme Court Associate Justice Anna Barbara Hantz Marconi claim in a new court filing that former Gov. Chris Sununu told investigators she didn’t ask him to interfere in any investigation involving her husband.
The 237-page response, filed this week in Merrimack Superior Court by Hantz Marconi’s lawyers, Richard Guerriero and Jonathan Kotlier, includes a transcript of an interview with Sununu conducted Aug. 6 by Tom Desfosses, an investigator with the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office, where the former governor says there was “no ask,” no request for action regarding the investigation, and no request for any benefit by Hantz Marconi during a June 6, 2024, meeting.
“I don’t think there was anything illegal about it,” Sununu said, adding he thought Hantz Marconi was simply expressing frustration with the circumstances affecting her ability to do her work as a justice on the state Supreme Court and on her personally.
Hantz Marconi was indicted by a Merrimack County grand jury in October on two felony charges: attempt to commit improper influence and criminal solicitation of improper influence, after she allegedly interfered with a criminal investigation involving her husband, Geno Marconi, director of the Division of Ports and Harbors in the Pease Development Authority. Geno Marconi has been on paid leave since April, and recently filed paperwork to retire.
Hantz Marconi was also charged with five misdemeanors: criminal solicitation of official oppression, official oppression, obstructing government administration, and two counts of criminal solicitation of misuse of position.
Her license to practice law in New Hampshire has been suspended while she is on administrative leave from the court.
According to the transcript of Sununu’s interview included in Guerriero’s filing, the former governor says he recalls the conversation with Hantz Marconi as “kind of just coming in, sitting down, expressing frustration and hoping that the thing would, would move quicker, and that’s, that’s all she said.”
“It seems like she was just expressing frustration ’cause there — like I said, there was no action request, no ask, frustration with the process,” Sununu said. “Hoping that it would move along, and that’s kind of how we left it. She was expressing frustration. Clearly not asking me to do anything. She didn’t ask anything of me. I didn’t get the sense it crossed the bounds … she wasn’t, you know, insinuating anything other than that she thought the whole thing was, you know, frivolous.
“I don’t think there was anything illegal about it, but I’m, I’m not a lawyer.”
Sununu made similar comments when asked again later in the interview about the conversation, reiterating, “There was no ask, there was nothing ‘Governor, I wish you could do this,’ or there was nothing like that.”
“But there was no ask, or expression that I should be doing anything.”
Asked for comment on the latest filing, a spokesman for the Department of Justice said in an email that the Merrimack County grand jury “heard all of the evidence in this case and determined that there was probable cause to charge the defendant with the crimes for which she was indicted.”
“This case will continue to proceed as required by New Hampshire law, and the defendant will be entitled to the same due process as any other defendant — no more, no less,” the statement reads. “We will try this case in court based on all of the evidence collected and not in the media using just a portion of that evidence.”
In December, Merrimack Superior Court Judge Martin P. Honigberg denied a motion filed by the Guerriero to dismiss the indictments against her and disqualify Attorney General John Formella from the case.
Honigberg wrote in his decision that Guerriero had argued that Formella represents Sununu, a key witness in the case, and “cannot serve two masters” in prosecuting Hantz Marconi, asking that the AG be disqualified from the case and dismiss the indictments alleging she interfered with a criminal investigation involving her husband.
According to the indictments against her, on or about June 6, Hantz Marconi told Gov. Chris Sununu that the investigation of her husband was “the result of personal, petty, and/or political biases” and there was no merit to the allegations against Geno Marconi.
She is also accused of telling Sununu the investigation of her husband “needed to wrap up quickly because she was recused from important cases pending or imminently pending before the New Hampshire Supreme Court,” according to the indictments.
In their latest filing, Guerriero and Kotlier again argue the case against Hantz Marconi should be dismissed.
“In short, none of the indictments state a crime,” the filing states. “The state has now produced discovery which shows it has nothing to add to what is already in the indictments. The state has not said it has some undisclosed evidence which will show that there is other conduct, not constitutionally protected, which would support a claim of criminal conduct.
“The state cannot allege a crime based on the evidence it has.”