![]() DeLeo, using a lit cigarette, a fireplace log, a glass ashtray, and his fist, would become Rhode Island lore. The story about Cianci’s vicious assault on Raymond S. In March 1983, after the Ciancis were granted a preliminary divorce decree, Cianci turned his wrath on a Bristol contractor who he believed was having an affair with his soon-to-be ex-wife. Vincent Vespia declined to comment recently, aside from saying there was “marital discord.” But Judith-Ann Vespia confirmed Bentley’s accounts of abuse and called her longtime friend “a survivor.” The Vespias, who’d been witnesses at the Ciancis’ wedding, testified in family court about the couple’s “irreconcilable differences.” My wonderful wife.’ ”īentley soon filed for divorce, on the grounds of “extreme cruelty,” according to the divorce complaint that was only unsealed in 2018. “And Vincent said to me, ‘My beautiful wife. “I was smiling, because it was almost over,” Bentley said. She wore a long green dress, long gloves, and a smile. They danced together for the last time at the inaugural ball for his third term, in 1983. ![]() John Tlumacki/Globe StaffĪfter nearly a decade with Cianci, Bentley had had enough. Rebecca Gibel (left) plays Bentley in the production, which is based on the life of the former Providence mayor. He was God,” she said, biting off the last word. She felt trapped, but she couldn’t break free. She wore her hair up to spite him and started calling him “Fats.” He wanted her fingernails painted red, and her hair as long as she could grow it, Bentley said. She took what she found from a money clip Cianci hid under his toupee when he took it off at night. “She said, ‘Sheila, if I were you, I’d pass him in the hall and say, Vincent, I need a charge card, precious love of my life. “And my doctor, who lived across the street, said to come upstairs, and they fixed it so it didn’t show.”īentley said another friend told her to take advantage of the arrangement. She said Vespia told her to take her hair down and put on some makeup. Such as on the night of Cianci’s second swearing-in, when she and her friend Judith-Ann Vespia were upstairs in the Ciancis’ Blackstone Boulevard mansion, trying to mask the bruise and swelling on Bentley’s face.īentley no longer remembers why Cianci struck her, just how she dealt with it. No matter what was happening privately, the couple had a public front. “He went ballistic,” she recalled.Ĭianci kept reporters waiting for hours at a press conference until his hairdresser could get him another wig. “Dance for Jesus, Vincent,” she commanded, and smashed a framed sketch of their Saint Bernard puppy, Panda, over his head.Īfter he failed to come home until 4:30 one morning, Bentley said, she flushed his toupee down the toilet. When they were dating, she caught him half dressed with a woman and drew a gun. In reality, Cianci’s affairs, and the fights with Sheila that followed, had begun before they were even married. “Which meant, he could date anyone he wanted” even as the two continued sharing a home.Ĭianci would later admit to a grand jury in May 1983 that he’d been involved with other women during his marriage. The deal dictated the number of public functions they had to attend together as a couple, and dinner as a family once a week at Joe Marzilli’s Old Canteen “where everyone could see us,” she said.Īnd, the most important part: “We could live separate and apart as though solo and unmarried, maintaining an ostensible family unit for the sake of his political career,” Bentley said, reciting from memory. So, Bentley said, the couple had then-Rhode Island Supreme Court Justice Thomas Paolino draw up an agreement in early 1982 it was later referred to in their divorce papers. Bentley became pregnant in the spring of 1973, and they wed a few months later, on Sept. “And we had wonderful times together.”īentley said they were in love, but her Irish mother and Cianci’s Italian mother didn’t approve. ![]() “He was crazy, she was crazy, and that’s what made them click,” Vespia recalled recently. Vespia and his soon-to-be wife, Judith-Ann, frequently socialized with Cianci and Bentley. Cianci was close with Vincent Vespia, a young state police detective who worked on organized crime cases with him. “We got along great in the beginning,” she said.īentley was a secretary and Cianci, now an Army reservist, was making a name for himself as a hotshot prosecutor going after the mob. The two hit it off, both of them quick-witted and fun. Cianci was a second lieutenant in the Army, stationed at Fort Devens, and wearing his dress blues. Sheila Bentley and Buddy Cianci met more than 50 years ago at the Copper Galley, a nightclub in a hotel just over the city line in Cranston.īentley, who had three sons and was going through a divorce, was out with a friend. “Buddy” Cianci Jr.’s inauguration in 1975.
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