Westford Registrars Revoke Connell's Residency

One time Westford selectman and recently re-elected Westford Republican Committee member Angel Connell was removed from the town’s voter checklist by a 4-0 decision of the Board of Registrars last night at the .

Connell left the committee in 2007 shortly after buying a house in Cumberland, Rhode Island, with the Registrars determining that Connell would have to declare his voter registration there instead of Westford from here on.

While Connell had declared his intention to move back to Westford as soon as possible to the board, citing his continued participation in the community and a continuous voting record in town that stretched back to 1975, the Registrars were torn by the fact that Connell had a Rhode Island driver’s license, paid Massachusetts out-of-state income taxes and was believed to have spent more of his time living in Rhode Island.

“I sincerely believe that Angel Connell is sincere in fully returning to Westford,” said Registrar Alisa Nakashian-Holsberg. “I’m just struggling with the facts.”

All four members had struggled that several hours of deliberation were needed during a meeting the week before on the subject, which continued with looks at other domicile cases in Massachusetts history.

The earlier cases varied wildly from a man forced to vote in Worcester due to a stay at a mental hospital there to Mitt Romney’s domicile dispute while running the Winter Olympics in 2002.

Connell claimed prior to the vote that if he wouldn’t be allowed to vote in Westford, that he would not vote anywhere,  and that his main goal in running for the committee once again was to elect public officials that he thought would improve the economy to the point where it would be feasible for him to move back to Westford full time.

“As I’ve said before, I’ve always considered Westford to be my home town, and I’ve indicated that I want to keep it that way,” said Connell to the board.

In addition to serving as a Selectman from 1989 to 1992 and on the committee from 1988 to 2007 (as chairman starting in 1999), Connell was also one of Massachusetts’ delegates to the Republican National Convention in 2004 and has received acclaim for his movie “Beneath the Veneer of a Murder,” .