7 | To America

You're listening to "I am not Nicholas", an audible original, episode 7, to America.

“We join our reporter Jane Maksoli, a sheer rise in the United States.”

We are a very good evening, a welcome to Boston, where the local time here is 21 minutes past 7 in the evening. So we have arrived about 55 minutes early. Why are we practicing to the terminal? Please keep yours to be a part of the location. So we're here for a week, you know, a week's a long time, seven days in the place where those who know

Nicholas Rossi are from. To one of the mysteries like it's top of my list that I want to try and solve in America, is the Louise phone calls. You know Louise, the so-called wife of Nicholas, who rang up saying he's dead. It was trying to arrange your pictures, and looking to plan a memorial service with the priest.

Father Haley.

“She said she was in Switzerland asking if I would celebrate a memorial mass for Nicholas, that's what I want.”

I want the Louise recording, if I get that, my God, I'll be happy. So I flew in into Boston and driven to Nicholas's hometown, Providence, Rhode Island. It's a muggy hot evening, and I head down the street from my hotel to the nearest bar. But appropriately for me, it's an Irish bar, and there's tidu crisps on the bar. The same ones I brought to Nicholas's Glasgow flat, all those months ago.

The place is staffed, naturally, by an Irish bartender. My name is Patrick, and it was a nice to hear a company voice. I'm here in Providence, Rhode Island working at Murphy's Irish pub, 100,000 street. By pure coincidence, the very first person I talked to, the very first person I even meet in the US, knows Nicholas Rossi.

I'm telling me, how do you know Nicholas Rossi? Well, he was coming in one night with a crowd, and it was a bit of a ruckus at the door, and it was a doorman that came in, brought attention to me. He was a very hard person to judge, and we got very angry and very mean, very quick. When you work at Barrier, you learn, I've been doing it for 30 years, you learn to...

You've got to be able to read a crowd of 150 people in seconds just by looking at that room,

and he is something that always stuck out.

I know that Nicholas used to hang out in a bar called Greg's, and that's where the journalist down McGon used to see him drinking. But this is another bar, Murphy's, and they knew him there too. Well, that was within one hour or less than the arriving in Providence in Rhode Island. The first person I talked to, the barman called Patrick from Norway.

He knew Nicholas Rossi, Oliverdeen, he served him several times. Anyway, I didn't talk to him tonight, because it was a busy Sunday night, but I've got his number, and he's going to tell me more. So, I mean, I know it's Providence's small cities by 180,000 people live here,

but it's just a weird feeling that the first person I engage with have a conversation with him.

He knew Nicholas Rossi, having served him several times. I spoke to him. My producer Helen joins me the next day, and we head off to meet a local politician called Brian Cougan. He's also a property investor, and we go to meet him at his office. How are you? How's it going, Brian? How's it going?

It's a traditional one-story wooden clapboard house, typical of those seen-throughite Providence. Brian has five sons, and he has their names tattooed on his arm. Is it difficult there? Yeah, I'm sorry. But I'm here to talk to him about a sixth son. He nearly adopted Nicholas. But is it Rossi or Aleverde a new normer?

Just a reminder, Nicholas was born Nicholas, Aleverdean, but changed his name to Nicholas Rossi when his mother remarried.

Aleverdean, Rossi, he switches back and forth, but I just would always refer to him as Nick.

“Brian used to be a local politician, a member of the Rhode Island House of Representatives, and that's how he met Nicholas back in 2001.”

Remember, I said that Nicholas was appointed at the age of 14 as a page in the Stead-Hice? Well, Brian met him through that. Yes, Nicholas really did have a job in politics age 14.

We'd heard about these pages, and I knew Nicholas was terribly pride of the fact he'd got one of these prestigious part-timers.

“Brian told me more about it. It was seen as a sort after all for young people who wanted to create politics.”

They used to run errands. They were like little mice. They just run around. Some reps were using to get coffee as a soldier. So Nick was there, and he was probably one of the best ones there. I mean, he was an overachiever, an overpleaser.

And you liked him? We all liked him, because, you know, if you asked him to do something, he would do it forth with. He wouldn't play around. He would get it done right away. Where other, you ask other kids that, you know, they did dream and they're looking around, you know, not paying attention, looking down at their shoes and leaving the against the wall.

When Nick was ready to attention, you know, you call him, he come running right over. What do you need? What do you need? What do you need?

I need rep. So first impressions were really very good. He struck. He's been intelligent as well.

Did he? Super intelligent. More than any other kid. It was on point. The young Nicholas is an asset to the state house, according to Brian. But remember this, it's also the period when his mother is struggling to look after him.

And he ends up in care. And that's when local politician Brian got to know him at the state house. So what happened then? So as the years went on, it started to unfold. He would say, I need a place to live.

I'm being abused. Come the fight. We found out he was in DCYF care. The department of youth and children services. We all believe there was being abused. Why?

Because he had scrapes, scratches and bruises on his body.

We wanted to help him because he was a young kid because

“most representatives are up to the state house to help people. That's what we run for, right?”

To help. And who could blame him for wanting to have a stable family home? He was looking for someone to adopt him. To get him out of the welfare center where he was staying. Right.

So we thought about it. We talked about it. But there was just something evil that you knew. Something just wasn't right. Perhaps sensing Brian Cougan's reservations. Nicholas suddenly puts the pressure on. Nick had called me up and he said,

"We're up, we're up, cougan. You've got to come down to the court. I was going to have to come down to the court. You have to come down here. You have to adopt me today today today." And he was crying to the phone. He was very dramatic. And he was so believable.

I said, Nick, I don't know if I can adopt you. I don't know if I'm willing to adopt you right now.

He says, well, if you don't, you're never going to see me again.

And you know, they're going to hurt me.

“I said, all right, well, let's go see the chief judge.”

And the chief judge had asked Nick to stay outside. And I went and I sat down with the chief judge like I am. If you know, he said, "Rep, you don't want to adopt this kid. This kid is pure evil. There's something wrong with him. He comes across as a normal kid, but he's really not a normal kid.

He's like one in a million." I did the judge to know this. I mean, what evidence was he based on? Jeremiah Jeremiah was the family court chief judge. So Nick's been before him, all his cases. And his file on his day,

he said, look at his file. On Nick. I said, judge just gets being abused. He said, "Rep, everything he's telling you, he's actually doing other kids."

I should mention that this was not said in open court. So we don't have a record of the judge's comments. I should also say that the rude island's department of children, youth and families would not comment on Nick's behavior. While he was in their car.

And I said, really. He says, "Everybody he's telling you, this kid is a bad kid. He's a bad seed. That's the worst of you. He's a bad seed." And he told me that his parents can't handle him.

His stepfather couldn't handle him. And that he'd run away from home. They'd find them. They put him in a group home. They'd find foster homes for him. And he would abuse other kids in these foster homes in group homes.

But he was also being abused too. At one point, I guess he was abused. So I felt bad for Nick. But at the same time, I'm thinking, while this kid's a monster himself.

I don't know whether it's true that Nicholas Rossi was abusing other kids in the car homes. But what I do recognize is that charm and manipulation he appears to deploy to this day. I don't blame Brian Cougan for not adopting Nicholas Rossi.

But my producer Helen tries to persuade me to be more sympathetic when we talk in the car later. If you were 14 and you were being abused or living in homes, and then you approached someone and begged them to adopt you. And they just sent up saying, "No."

And everybody turns you for help just says no.

Of course you would be angry, but it can't excuse him for what it's all led to. Nicholas stays in care. He gets sent out of state. He is said he was in care in Nebraska and Florida.

And we know as a young adult, he was living in Dayton, Ohio, which is where at the age of 21, he attacks fellow student Mary Grubinski and becomes a registered sex offender. So he pinned me up against the wall and he started violently kissing me. So I was trying to push him off me and get away.

I was begging with him. Nicholas disappears from the state high seen every nine then,

but he never stays away for long.

In 2011, he turns up claiming to be a student at Harvard. What he doesn't reveal is that he's being convicted of a sexual assault in Ohio. And his Harvard claims are a bit of an exaggeration. Although he does take a number of literature courses at Harvard, they are at the extension school,

a night school that is not Harvard University and does not have the same rigorous admission requirements.

“One should remember him as an earnest, intelligent student,”

and somewhat anxious generally. In 2012, his Harvard experience is a abruptly cut short when the Harvard University Police Department aroused Nicholas on a night standing warrant for crimes he allegedly committed in other states.

And he leaves the campus in disgrace. This is the same man who publicly talks about and builds a public profile of his experiences

of being abused in care homes.

After a hard day finding out about Nicholas Rossi's rude island days, I needed a drink. And I really should switch off, but I don't want to. I want to carry on finding out about Nicholas Rossi.

Luckily, my new friend, Barman Patrick, is happily humoring me and my producer Helen with his recollections of Nicholas Rossi, the young political campaigner. He always came to suit,

but I was carrying a briefcase or paperwork. Patrick tells me about a time when he and his mates try to be friends, Nicholas. When we'd be off in during the Monday night, we all hung out and played there,

trying to invite him into the crowd,

and then we did a one night and we'd never do it again.

Nicholas apparently just go into arguments with Patrick's friends. People got a scared of him, especially girls. They're very scared of him.

“I think one time we had to kick him out to him”

and he might even be in the women's room. Wow. That's kind of a sketchy guy, and he just took out. He just, for a bartender, he's took out. You got to watch this guy, he's going to cause trouble.

He's going to do something. Patrick remembers Nicholas sometimes not been able to pay his bar bills and presenting him with credit cards in different names. But there was also a period when he was throwing a lot of money

about there were rumors that the settlement Nicholas received from Rhode Island's child welfare department for abuse and care was worth around $70,000. But the Rhode Island government would comment, so it's possible he didn't receive a penny,

but he appeared to have got money from somewhere. He apparently arrived at the state house in a hired lemmo and took state representatives out for extravagant dinners. He entertained people at Murphy's bar too. I remember when I needed book to party,

he said he was working at the state house. I didn't believe that the guy was actually working at the state house, but I played a lot of money. And what he was, yeah, for any book to party for, like 30, 40 people and two people showed up.

He just was a very difficult guess to deal with because you weren't sure what he was going to do. As far as I can make out not one state representative question Nicholas's tall tales of Harvard, nor discovers that he was a registered sex offender.

Why would they? He's a child abuse victim. I respected container, who is appeared all over the local news. He's not heard of much in Rhode Island after 2017, until early 2020, when the fake death plant appears to take ship.

“Remember the end of 2019 is when he announces through the media,”

but he's terminally ill. Unfortunately, I've been diagnosed with non-hotsetchip lymphoma and unfortunately, this has come much too soon in my life. This came as a bit of a surprise to his family. When he was supposedly dying, he was calling reporters

and television stations and lawyers. Didn't call the family. Didn't call me. You know, that goes through my head. It's the one of two things.

One, he knew I'd get upset. Or two, he didn't want to break my hot. By saying, I'm dying at cancer. Or three, he was a complete on-truth and he just couldn't take himself to do that.

to meet Michael L. Averion, Nicholas's uncle at a hotel.

Michael is the guy who went on TV a few months back to say he wasn't convinced either way that Arthur Knight was really his nephew, Nicholas Rossi. There's a slight resemblance by the mannerisms and the weak to whom he awful would have been.

I am skeptical about whether or not Michael is able to be truly objective about Nicholas. If he can't even admit that Arthur Knight, Nicholas Rossi, are clearly the same man. But he seems sincere and kind.

He hasn't been well, and despite the fact he's walking with a stick and appears to be in a bit of pin, he's dressed up smartly and driven an arm from his hometown of Vernon, Connecticut, to meet us. We hope that we can finally get to the truth

of Nicholas's childhood.

“And I think it's the closest we will get to a sense”

of who Nicholas Rossi struck Oliverian really is. So when did you first meet Nick? We were together for the first seven years of his life

because I would always visit and just always smiling,

and always running into my arms when he saw me. And what happened was my brother... That's Nicholas's birth father. Was the type of person that he would throw tantrums and so his wife basically went into hiding with the children.

And how old was Nick at this stage? He was about probably eight years old, seven or eight at this point. And so I'd looked for them and could not find them, couldn't get any information. For your father to walk out onto the family life

on Nick's life at a very early age at the seven, eight, when he was age seven, eight must have had a massive impact on him and for the years to come. Right. I am starting to change my view of why Nicholas is who he is.

And I'm even starting to feel a wee bit sorry for him. Then did Nick end up going into the welfare system as well. He was still with his mom, but it was like slowly, they just having problems. And then eventually went into the system.

Because she couldn't look after him either. I think it was a combination. I think Nick had some issues. Michael explained to me that Nicholas's birth father wasn't really in a position to look after him either.

You know, my brother was in trouble here and there. That type of thing. And I, my whole life, I tried to avoid trouble. A trouble comes to you anyway. I was a single father, raising three children.

So I had a lot of responsibilities. So I didn't see Nick for, I'd say 15 years.

“So when did Nick then come back into your life again?”

I received the message on Facebook. Believe it was 2008-11. Remember by this stage, Nicholas is a convicted sex offender who's been thrown off the Harvard campus because of an outstanding arrest warrant.

But in Rhode Island, he presented himself as a Harvard man and a children's rights-lobist. So we started communicating, starting getting together a little bit and he was at that point trying to get his life together

basically. I tried to become the father figure to try to guide him and just show him, hey, this is life. This is, this is, you gotta do the right thing in life. So you met up with him?

I did meet up with him. And we spent six to seven years together and a few days every single. I saw, I actually ended up seeing Nick more than I did my own children.

I spent so much time with him. So it was a very close bond? Yes. Yes.

“Was there any contact that he had that you knew of”

with his father or his mother? Yes. He tried calling his father a couple of times and then he would get off the phone with my brother, his father, and call me

and say, I can't talk to my dad. He just doesn't listen. He doesn't understand. You have to guide with a loving hand. You have to listen to your children.

And my brother, unfortunately, couldn't do that. It's sad. We had a lot of discussions. We spent time together.

He basically told me that he could not have

even a conversation with his father. He went through a lot, which I didn't know again until 2011. Like what?

He told me a lot of things.

You know, beatings. He said one of the worst things that nobody believed him and nobody would listen to him. Do you believe what Nick told you about in the welfare system?

About all the abuse that he said he sustained? I do believe it. There's probably some exaggeration in that. But you'd have to have like a great story mind to make it, what they were doing to him.

One of the big things that this bothers me probably more than anything else. And I know it sounds like it's about me because it's not. It's about necklace.

When he was putting force to homes,

they never came to me or my siblings.

All my parents, at that point, and said, "We're putting him in force to home. You want to take him in." They never contacted our family to take him in. Because I would have taken him in in a second

and raised him. He's shocking really, isn't it? Yeah. So it was difficult because it changed his life. It definitely changed his life.

So if that opportunity hadn't been missed, if you had been asked, you would have absolutely

“100% taken him in like one of your children, right?”

My children, right? Yeah. So how do you think things would have changed then? No guarantees in life.

But he would have had a parent.

And I would have been his parent. And I would have supervised him. And he would have known that somebody loved him. If I could have tried to erase him and take care of him, and I think he'd be an asset to society.

100%, I believe that. Why did it all go so wrong? You can't throw children to force the homes with an outworld. And they're getting abused and beaten.

They don't come out any better from that. Do you think that's the number of it, really? I really do. There are plenty of examples out there that people have changed their life for the better.

And they've gone through similar things. But they changed their life. He couldn't do it for some reason. There's something missing and still is. If he's acting like this.

But you're still at the opinion of the night. It's not Nicholas Rossi. Well, it's changing again. I'm starting to, and I'll tell you the reason it's starting to change.

It's because I watched some kind of video clip recently. And he had an attitude. And he came out with a peace sign

“and quoted something from Sherlock Holmes, I believe.”

And what innocent person would bring that attention on themselves? I also remember this moment exactly. Arthur is stroking Nicholas arrived at court in his burgundy pajamas and dressing going as he made his way from an ambulance to the court in his wheelchair.

A reporter asked him if the game was up. Arthur stroking Nicholas replied by quoting Sherlock Holmes. The game has just started. The game is a foot. Nicholas's behavior, his goating of the press,

his ramboyance, his attention seeking, is not so wide of control. His uncle Michael thinks it seems to indicate. Not just guilt, but a lack of remorse. Why would you do that when you're going through all this?

Why would you continue to challenge the system, challenge the law? If you commit a crime, you deserve the punishment. It's very simple. He needs to be tried for what he's done.

It's sad. It's sad. To see somebody you love go wrong. I'll always love him. But if he's accused of all this and if he gets sentenced,

all I can do is pray for him. Can you forgive him? I can't forgive him for what he's done to other people. That's up to them. But I can forgive him for what he's done to me.

What Michael's just laughed. We've walked him out to his car. We're still in the room when we were interviewing him in the hotel. He's a bit of, he's a broken man to me. You know what was that?

Look on his face.

“I think this was him taking on board in front of us.”

Because he didn't want to admit it. My producer, Helen, and I are trying to process what Michael has told us about his nephew, Nicholas.

He has become a monster because of what happened to him.

He's a sexual offender. He's got these charges of rape hanging over him. He's been horrendous too. Many people, multiple people, and both sides of the living. You, me and me.

And yes, I hearing it now from Michael. The whole A to Z. You know, unpacking it. You know, we've heard it. We've heard it, but really, from his flesh and blood.

His uncle. That, you know, just how bad it was for him. I do feel sorry for Nick. There's a reason now for this behavior.

“People often joke that you have to wait until you're dead for everybody to say nice things about you.”

In Nicholas Rossi's case, of course, he couldn't hang on that long. So in 2020, he brings it forward. At the bedside where Mrs. Alavarian, their two children, and extended family. His last words were, "Fear not and run toward the bliss of the sun." Apart from the cheesy online obituary which signs suspiciously like it might have been written by Nicholas,

there's the mysterious Louise. The woman who claims to be his widow, but who nobody is actually met. She's ringing her on trying to organize a memorial service for him, and asking journalists to write tributes. And there's a press release, too.

Just before COVID strikes, they announced that he died. I catch up with Dan McGuyen, the Boston Globe journalist, who when he was a local reporter in Rhode Island. New Nicholas Rossi. Dan immediately suspected the press release of 19 Nicholas Rossi's death was phony.

“It was from the official desk of, I think it went that moment.”

It was from his alleged wife named Louise. I also just found the tail to be a little bit just off. And I remember I flagged for my editor at the time, and I said, "Look, I don't think we should write anything about this." We did in fact publish the associated press version of just announcing the death essentially. And we reported it overnight, and it just happens to be that I wake up really early.

I caught it, and I said, "Hey, I'm pulling this down, and we immediately pulled it." I couldn't have been up for more than four hours. I would say it might not have been up for 90 minutes. And within minutes of us pulling it, we were getting emails from this woman Louise, claimed to be his wife saying that we were disregarding him and dishonoring him. And it was a lot of accusations of how could you do this.

Louise doesn't let it lie. She rings down directly to try to persuade him to write something. This only makes him all the more convinced it's a hoax. Some of the other people Louise rings, say she signs German or even Russian. But Dan is clear about the nationality of this mystery woman.

Suddenly I was talking to a woman that sounded a little bit like you.

It was British and had an accent, and I was at first thinking, "Oh my God, I made him stick.

This is his wife, because you're talking to a woman with an English accent." Did you think it was generally a British woman? No, by the end of that conversation, I was convinced it was him changing his voice.

“I think about the fully-neurined voice changing up that my colleague Barney demonstrated to me.”

It's a free app, which you can download. My voice is arguably a number of options here as well as I can become somewhat a bit younger. But that's not bad. I'd love to hear a tape of this so-called Louise person. So we could try to spot any telltale authorisms in the speech.

But unfortunately, down doesn't have a recording. But while we're here, I think we might as well try to eliminate someone else. From our inquiries. So, Dan, we'll give this a week old. But this is Miranda speaking to me and April.

Let's see if this sounds familiar in any way to you. So, from my point of view, "Oh, there's not a white-beater at all.

He's never hurt me, never touched me. He doesn't abuse me.

I love him." Not even close. Not even close. And just one, it was the level of confidence in her voice. It was not what I heard when I talked to Louise.

The other thing that stands out is her accent is slightly different. I can't. I mean, you were shaking your head from the very moment you heard her voice.

Miranda is his current wife. Her middle name is Louise.

“So, you know, maybe he did use some device and just used his middle name of his wife.”

No, I mean, there's no way that was who I spoke to. No way.

“The police are convinced it's Nicholas too.”

We thought, hey, this the least person wasn't real.

We thought it was Nick the whole time. Sounded very automated.

“My producer Helen and I have been trying desperately to find someone who recorded one of those phone calls from Louise.”

So far, no luck.

But then I'm driving around Rhode Island with Helen in the passenger seat.

Checking emails when something comes through, which makes me nearly crash the car. We've managed to get a recording of the mysterious widow Louise. Helen plays it to me straight away. Oh, my God. It's Miranda!

I put the allegations made in this episode too Nicholas Rossi in a letter. He didn't reply.