![]() ![]() By 1990, he regained the mayor's office in his first comeback, squeaking through as an Independent in a tight three-way race. Cianci left City Hall after being charged. He was accused of using a fireplace log and a lit cigarette in the attack, although he denied some of the details. As the Republican anticorruption candidate, Cianci became legend when he pleaded no contest to charges involving a sensational 1983 assault on a man suspected of involvement with his estranged wife. I didn't carry any Italian areas except one.ĭONNIS: It was historic when Cianci won election as the first Italian-American mayor of Providence in 1974. I would be absolutely flabbergasted if I were mayor and the streets were like this.ĭONNIS: Cianci said identity politics were not a big part of his political success.ĬIANCI: Remember, when I ran for mayor, I didn't get all the Italian vote. And I think since that time, we've experienced $110 million deficits, potholes in streets. VINCENT BUDDY CIANCI: I love being mayor and I think that we had a real roll going on in the city. Here's how Cianci put it after announcing his second comeback attempt in 2014 in a hallway at the talk-radio station where he worked as an afternoon host. He maintained he was innocent of corruption and said he was motivated by his passion for Providence. MIKE STANTON: There was the charismatic Buddy that wanted to be your friend, would do anything to help you, was entertaining and made you feel good about your city, and then there was the other Buddy who whether, as he says, he didn't know about it or not, you know, presided over a City Hall where there was a range of corruption, there was a range of people doing things that they shouldn't have been doingĭONNIS: Cianci downplayed his responsibility for the problems during his two stints as mayor, a total of about 20 years in office. His biographer, former Providence Journal reporter Mike Stanton, explained the two sides of Buddy as he was called in a 2014 interview. IAN DONNIS, BYLINE: The 74-year-old Cianci was a picture of jagged contrasts. Ian Donnis of Rhode Island Public Radio examines why. The judge who sentenced Cianci likened him to Dr. ![]() Years later, he went to prison for corruption. As a young prosecutor, he led the state's anticorruption strike force. was a tightly-wound bundle of contradictions.
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