Rhode Island City Councilor who resigned after drug charge now facing child molestation charges

A Rhode Island man who recently stepped down from a political position after a drug charge is now also facing child molestation charges.

According to Colonel Michael Winquist, Chief of the Cranston Police Department, Cranston Police Detectives responded Thursday to the Town of North Kingstown and arrested 41-year-old Matthew Reilly of Cranston, RI, on an arrest warrant for the following charges: First Degree Child Molestation, Second Degree Child Molestation and Enticement of a Person Under the Age of 16.

The arrest warrant resulted from an investigation by Detectives from the Cranston Police Special Victims Unit and the prosecutors from the Office of the Rhode Island Attorney General that began on May 7, 2023, after the legal guardian of a twelve-year-old girl (unrelated to Reilly) filed a complaint at Cranston Police Headquarters. Members of the North Kingstown Police Department assisted Cranston Police Detectives in taking Reilly into custody without incident.

Reilly was transported to Cranston Police Department Headquarters, photographed, and fingerprinted. He was then transported to the Third District Court in Warwick and arraigned before Magistrate Joseph Ippolito, who ordered Reilly held without bail pending a competency hearing.

Reilly resigned from the Cranston City Council and as chairman of the Cranston Republican Party last month after being charged with one count of drug possession when officers allegedly found him having a medical episode while holding a glass pipe and a lighter.