Newmarket State Rep's Speeding-Ticket Saga Takes A State House Turn

By Damien Fisher, NH Journal

An angry email blasted out by Rep. Ellen Read’s designated communications director in response to a Boston Globe story about her lead-footed legal woes may have inadvertently thrown Read’s close confidant, House Clerk Paul Smith, under the bus.

On Monday, The Boston Globe’s Steven Porter published a detailed look at Read’s two recent speeding tickets and her attempts to use her status as a state representative to get off the hook.

Read was stopped on Dec. 2, 2024, going 107 mph on I-93 in Windham and again on June 5, 2025, on I-93 in Londonderry, going 92 mph, according to court records. In both cases, Read insisted she could not be stopped or ticketed because she was a state representative leaving the State House.

Read and her nonlawyer legal representative, Dana Albrecht, are asking the New Hampshire Supreme Court to allow her to appeal two speeding tickets, partly on the grounds that state representatives are immune from traffic stops. The court denied her appeal petition last month, but Albrecht filed a motion for reconsideration.

The New Hampshire Constitution states that legislators cannot be stopped while going to the State House or conducting official business. According to Albrecht’s petition, Read’s speeding home or to her day job in Massachusetts after being at the State House is no different from a police officer or EMT speeding to an emergency.

“The question presented is whether a sitting legislator, traveling to or from the General Court in the exercise of a privilege expressly conferred by N.H. Const. pt. II, art. 21, is entitled to the same analysis — not greater protection, but equal protection,” Albrecht wrote.

Again, Albrecht is not an attorney.

Read’s self-described professional communications director, Grace Gato, sent a furious email to members of the media — NHJournal was conspicuously left off the list — responding to Porter’s story. One of her many questionable legal defenses of Read’s efforts was that the officer involved in the Dec. 2, 2024, stop was rude to the representative.

Gato offered as evidence the views of someone she described as “a distinguished State House employee,” who she claims was “on the phone with Rep. Read throughout the stop and who later testified in person, giving an account of the interaction that conflicted directly with the officer’s characterization of it.”

“He plainly cited that at no point was Rep. Read hostile, but that the officer became hostile with her when she questioned the practice of giving a reckless driving ticket when no speed was clocked and no dangerous behavior was observed. That conflict was part of the trial record,” Gato wrote.

While Gato doesn’t identify the “distinguished State House employee,” multiple sources in both political parties confirm it is House Clerk Paul Smith, who is known to have a close relationship with Read.

Public records show Smith wrote Read a letter on Dec. 9, 2024, excusing her from court on Jan. 8, 2025, because it was a scheduled House session.

Read acknowledges she spends a lot of time at the State House. Multiple State House sources note that much of that time is spent with Smith.

Of interest to taxpayers — and possibly the Attorney General’s Office — is NHJournal’s reporting on Read’s claims for nearly $20,000 in mileage reimbursement, including days when there was no legislative activity at the State House, and records indicate Read was apparently absent.

In the last House session alone, she claimed reimbursement for showing up on 279 days, despite not sitting on any committees or having any duties beyond those of a typical backbench member.

For context, House Minority Leader Alexis Simpson (D-Exeter) was at the State House on 261 days, and Senate Minority Leader Rebecca Perkins Kwoka (D-Portsmouth) was in Concord for 163 days.

Court records show Read spent an extended period in court on April 27, 2026, dealing with her criminal charges, for example. But that didn’t stop her from also filing for her usual $69.60 State House travel reimbursement.

Read said she just takes her job very seriously. According to Citizens Count, Read was the prime sponsor of an impressive 29 bills in the last session. Less impressive is the fact that just one of her bills managed to become law.

Gato argues that Read is the target of these legal and ethical inquiries because of her efforts to defund the New Hampshire Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence.

“The real thing to pay attention to here is the fact that right after Rep. Read pushed for an investigation on a corrupt domestic violence network that doesn’t deliver adequate survivor services but continues to bill public funds for them… a two-year-old closed case is surfacing now, from a reporter who has repeatedly positively covered that corrupt organization for years, right after his reporting a story about Rep. Read’s legitimate legislative mileage,” Gato wrote.

Read, Gato, and Albrecht are allies of Claire Best, and together they have trafficked in unfounded conspiracy theories that NHCADSV is secretly engaged in child sex trafficking.

“Rep. Read introduced a bill this year to require critical thinking in public schools exactly so people would be able to see through bad journalism like this,” Gato wrote.

Gato made headlines when she was allegedly caught voting for her dead mother and then claimed grief made her do it.

That criminal voter fraud trial is set for later this year.

This story was originally published by the NH Journal, an online news publication dedicated to providing fair, unbiased reporting on, and analysis of, political news of interest to New Hampshire. For more stories from the NH Journal, visit NHJournal.com.