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Mass. businessman, Lebanon summer resident gets prison in bizarre kidnapping, touching case

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Thomas Minichiello is handcuffed by a court bailiff after his sentencing. Inset, Afterward, victim Maelyn Emerson and friend Beverly Downing talk to the press about the trial. (Lebanon Voice photos)

DOVER, N.H. - Thomas Minichiello's past came back to bite him bigtime on Monday.

The former Massachusetts insurance agency owner and Greater Haverhill Chamber of Commerce president was sentenced to at least three years in prison after being found guilty in the bizarre kidnapping case of a Rochester woman in Dover in 2013, just five years after he was accused in a similar case in Massachusetts that prosecutors dropped.

In the April 2008 incident which occurred in Marlborough, Mass., court records indicate a woman said Minichiello lured her to the Courtyard Marriott on the pretense of getting a job with his fitness company.

Minichiello was alleged to have touched the woman inappropriately several times and beat and dragged her back to his hotel room after she tried to flee. The second time she fled the room, the woman escaped, running naked to the front desk to seek help, police said.

In June 2008 prosecutors apparently dropped the case and he was later called in on just misdemeanor charges, which were later continued without a finding.

While the jury that found him guilty in the Dover case never heard about the 2008 incident, Judge Brian Tucker ruled during Monday's hearing that he would consider the findings of the case in delivering his sentence despite the objections of defense attorney Thomas Gleason of Haverhill.

"This is a slippery slope," Gleason said arguing that there had been no conviction in the 2008 case and that prosecutors dropped the case for a reason.

Tucker noted, however, that Minichiello had admitted to sufficient facts in the 2008 case and that the incident was eerily similar to the one in 2013 at Dover's Comfort Inn.

Testimony during his four-day trial proved that Minichiello had threatened the Rochester woman with physical harm if she didn't submit to a battery of bizarre physical tests in which he measured her heart rate and blood pressure while touching her breasts and vagina, purportedly as part of a job interview with his supposed fitness company that was soon to open in Rochester.

Calling Minichiello "deviant, predatory and crafty," prosecutor
Alysia Cassotis declared that he had used his power and prestige as a successful businessman to manipulate and intimidate the victim, Maelyn Emerson, who for the first time allowed media to photograph and interview her after the sentencing.

Emerson, standing with her longtime friend and confidante, Beverly Downing, of Farmington, said outside the courtroom that she just wanted to get on with her life and put the episode in the past.

She said she was happy with the sentencing rendered by Tucker, which includes a three and a half to seven-year prison term with only six months suspended upon Minichiello's successful completion of a sex offender class.

The sentence also includes no-contact orders for Emerson and her family, a $4,000 fine, $680 in penalty assessment and up to $10,000 in potential payments for Emerson's counseling.

Gleason, in his request for heavily monitored probation only, argued that his client's bizarre behavior was born of personal tragedy when his daughter died in car crash 11 years ago, which ended up costing his marriage as well.

Gleason also said the public would not benefit by a long incarceration for his client, whom he stressed never caused Emerson any physical harm during the kidnapping.

However, while there was no physical harm shown, testimony revealed Minichiello had threatened Emerson's children and had two hypodermic needles on a bureau in the hotel room that made her feel threatened.

Cassotis also stressed that while there may have been no physical harm done, the psychological harm was significant.

Emerson only saved herself from possible rape by telling Minichiello she had AIDS, court testimony revealed.

He then drove her home to her downtown Rochester apartment.

Minichiello, of Groveland, Mass., but whose family also owns a lakefront home in Lebanon, will now consider the possibility of an appeal, Gleason said.

In a brief apology during his sentencing, Minichiello said, "I am sorry for all of the actions that happened and the people that I touched, that I hurt, I'm sorry."

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