Graphic Warning: This article contains a graphic image on a flyer that we are sharing to give context to what citizens in Beacon received hand-delivered to their homes.

Back in June, 2020, a reader wrote into A Little Beacon Blog about a flyer they found to be disturbing, that had been put into their yard. The flyer contained a message of anti-choice abortion, and wasn’t the first time this reader had received a flyer. Last year around this time, the reader received a series of anti-gay fliers. This reader has a rainbow pride flag flying from their house, and says they are a queer family. Quickly, a rumor circulated that it was the KKK, which was reported by one news outlet but then retracted almost the same day.

This family wasn’t the only ones to receive the distributed flyers. Other residents with gay pride flags flying outside their homes had also received the flyers. The reader was spooked, has children, and was afraid to let their children play in the front yard. They wrote in: “I am hoping to raise awareness. There was a new wave of anti-choice abortion flyers distributed to the folks who have rainbow flags today. We got one last week and another 2 today thrown into our yard. Last year we got an anti-gay one (we are a queer family). I wanted to raise attention to it if others are receiving these too. I don’t want to be public on Facebook and open my family up further to harassment, but I wanted to draw some attention if there’s a larger trend.”

Several other households had been receiving flyers. At least two others reached out to A Little Beacon Blog to submit photos of the flyers they received and shared with the police. Said one recipient, Kit Burke-Smith, who has a pride flag flying and is part of a straight family: “We believe we have been targeted each time because of our pride flag on our house. Generally, we have found our community to be wonderfully caring and supportive. Knowing that one of our neighbors is repeatedly attempting to intimidate us and others in our community is reprehensible and disappointing,” she told A Little Beacon Blog.

The original reader pursued various channels to get the mail to stop. “Last year, I reported the letter to the police. I spoke to [then] Mayor Casale and a few attorneys, reported the harassment to the postal police, the New York Hate Crimes division and many others. I had dozens of conversations to report the harassment, and to my knowledge, nothing was done.“

Then came 2020. In the middle of the pandemic, and during Pride Month, a new batch of letters arrived. The Beaconite continued: “A few weeks ago, we found the abortion one on the car. I ignored it, honestly. Then, Saturday, we got a new batch thrown into the yard. Other folks we know got them on the porch."

Councilperson Terry Nelson of Ward 1 spoke out against the flyer campaign during his Community Report section of a City Council Meeting, saying: “Unfortunately, a first-grader of one of those families found the letter,” he said. “This has to stop. You have to stop doing this. To the coward who left those fliers, myself and a bunch of other people are allies of the LBGTQ community and just know that there are more of us than there are of you.”

Flyer recipients began suspecting that one of their neighbors was the sender. A Little Beacon Blog asked if they had considered simply approaching their neighbor to ask them to stop. Their response: “I am nervous about my children playing in the front yard.”

Style And Tone Of Letters And Flyers Begin To Match A Public Figure

Having seen the content of the letter, the style and tone resembled that of another Beaconite who has published his statements against abortion before in the Beacon Free Press an on his own blog. The style was so close, in fact, it resembled this letter to the editor published last year that sparked a large backlash to the newspaper for even publishing it. Here at A Little Beacon Blog, it inspired an article to be written about censorship. The writer, Richard (Dick) Murphy, had cried out to his newsletter list about local newspapers who had censored him. A Little Beacon Blog wrote in response the need for censorship, why it is helpful in some cases, and how it happens every single day because media outlets simply cannot publish all of the words in all of the world every single day.

Just as we were going to cross reference the styles, another Beacon resident received a postmarked letter from R. Murphy, with his return address on it. The postmark was out of Albany. The letter began by referencing his former political campaigning days: “I prefer handouts to signs, too many of them during my political campaigns I guess.” He signed the letter Dick Murphy. A Little Beacon Blog put on the list of things to do: “Email Richard Murphy to ask him if he is the same R. Murphy from the signed letter, and if he has been distributing unsigned flyers.”

When readers write in to you, spooked for their own safety and the safety of their children, a blogger will seek truth. While it seems unkind to call attention to someone who is doing something that most people would find mentally unhealthy, even if most of their intentions in other parts of their lives are good, to the receivers of the flyers and letters, they are frightened. Plus, conclusions are fabricated and made up. For instance, because this happened during the BLM protests all over the world,that the flyers were from the KKK. So to help these people find an answer and ease their fear, this article was produced.

Confirmation Pursued; Confirmation Received

On July 16, 2020, an email came into my inbox from Richard (Dick) Murphy. It happens from time to time. Richard (he prefers to go by Dick), sends emails to his list of about 125 people, most of whom never signed up for his list, wanting to know their opinions of his latest blog posts. Years ago, without my approval, and without me even knowing who he was, Richard added me to his newsletter list. When he can’t get published in a newspaper, he emails this list of email addresses to rant about it, and rails about the First Amendment protecting his right to get published in a newspaper.

Some people request to be removed from his list, and then he denies their request, citing the First Amendment. His response last year on July 19, 2019 to my request to be removed, when I referred him to the Can-Spam Act: “THE CAN-SPAM Act...gad! Never said you were required.” And then I was never removed.

This time, on July 16, 2020, he asked us what we thought of the removal General Lee’s statue. This sounds pretty random, and it is. Richard has a thought, blogs about it, and then emails us on his list. Richard didn’t specify which General Lee statue. My assumption is that he is referring to the 6-story statue in Richmond, VA. I replied to him via email by asking him questions about the flyers and the letters he sent with his signature and home address on them in the return address section of the envelope.

On July 17, 2020, Richard (Dick) emailed me back about the flyers. Hi hit Reply-All to his whole list, and sent me the below response:

“Regarding the First Amendment, it's a glorious thing. Hand delivering information to houses is done all the time especially during political campaigns and unfortunately it now seems it is always political campaign time in our country. The news is full of it, the media the newspapers etc. If a citizen thinks certain topics are not being given sufficient coverage or if local newspapers avoid printing letters of one opinion or another it is incumbent to find alternative ways to communicate. As I said, Isn't the First Amendment wonderful and isn't a healthy, reasoned and honest exchange of ideas what democracy is all about? Really, a "Love thy Neighbor" message shouldn't be all that "disturbing" or "scary." And, regarding "grotesque? Isn't 60,000,000 new lives destroyed by abortion since Roe rather grotesque? Let's keep the exchange going for the sake of democracy and the nation we love.

Sincerely, Dick

PS.Please include my remarks in your article and also invite the complaints to join in the discussion. This is hardly "targeting." It; a call for honest, reasoned dialogue and debate, It's just what the country needs.”

How The City Of Beacon Responded

In June 2020, Pride Month, Mayor Lee Kyriacou donated a pride flag to City Hall. The rainbow flag flew all month. A Little Beacon Blog reached out to the Mayor, the City Administrator Anthony Ruggiero, and to Terry Nelson who had first spoken against the flyers, asking if the City had received any letters, since it had the pride flag, as well as how they felt about this outreach. Anthony usually knows the rules around campaigning, knocking on doors, and perhaps about distributing flyers, so we sought some guidance there.

So far, we have only received a response from Terry. Questions and answers are thus follows:

ALBB: During a City Council Meeting when you first addressed the issue, did you know who was placing and sending the flyers?

“I had my suspicions, but I couldn’t 100% confirm it.”

ALBB: How do you feel about a neighbor sending his neighbors mail about his personal views? On a repeated basis?

“I hate it because it is harassment, plain and simple. I even asked this individual to stop emailing me his hate filled, bigoted blog posts only to have him accuse me of violating his first amendment rights. I never asked to be placed on his email list. This has gone on for about two years.”

Who Is Richard (Dick) Murphy?

Richard lives in Beacon and cares about it very much. He has a political history, that for clarification sake, I asked him to confirm so that we can know how he served:

“By the 1960s I was teaching High School American History putting the stress on The Bill of Rights and specifically the First Amendment as well as the amendments aiming for political and racial equality, Getting into Democratic Politics in the 1970s and appointed by Mayor Cahill to Chair the Beacon Human Relations Committee, I aimed at the integration of the Beacon Volunteer Fire Department, accomplished in 1978. A Democrat for most of my life, I ran on the Party line for a seat in the County Legislature in 1979 and was defeated. Ran again in 1981 and won and was reelected eight times retiring in 1999. I became Minority Whip in the Legislature for several years serving under an excellent Minority Leader Mrs. Kip Bleakley. I was pushed into a dissenter role by the Party when it gagged Governor Casey of PA barring him from giving a pro-life address to the delegates at the 1992 Convention.“