Business & Tech

GOP Vendor Has Past Soft Porn Client

Should Republican candidates be accountable for vendor's past clients?

A vendor, which has helped to build many GOP candidate websites in the Summerville area, has deleted links showing it aided in website work for a soft pornography website. 

Summerville Media Group, a local web and graphic design company, came under scrutiny Sunday with a blog posting by liberal blogger Rob Groce, who claimed the Republican party's "clean" message might be tarnished by using a vendor with less-than-clean clients

SMG and its affiliated company, 106 Designs, works on sites for Rep. Chris Murphy, District 97 candidate Ed Carter and others in the Summerville area.

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While Groce claims the company touted work on Sexy Skin Magazine as late as Sunday, SMG owner Jamie Lucarelli said the work was old and links to the work were taken down before the blog posting.

"I did some graphic work on it years ago and I wanted to post writing about some of the graphic work I did," said Lucarelli, who said he also pulled down some mayoral race websites and that Sexy Skin is no longer in operation.

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We do a lot of graphic design, SEO, and Social Networking for Sexy Skin MAgazine. I do a lot of the Photo Edits of the girls and we offer Photoshop lessons to the editing staff behind Sexy Skin Magazine. We also design the magazine covers for all the issues. The site is a high class forum style like Maxum. Lots of good articles and celeberity info. Check it out!!

Carter said he did not research who the vendor has served in the past. He said he got the recommendation from Murphy's office.

"I had no idea about that; it was strictly business," Carter said. "But I don't see why that's a problem. It's not like he owns (the soft porn site)."

But Dorchester County Republican Chair Carroll Duncan said the link to soft porn might warrant candidates switching businesses.

"I trust (our candidates) to find the best vendor to suit their needs and their financial picture, but I would think if they found out something like that, if it were to be true, they wouldn't use them," Duncan said. "We don't tell them who and what to use. My guess is they didn't have that information."

Murphy and Carter said they're sticking with Lucarelli. 

"I'm not going to stop using him because of another vendor — including if he's doing work for a competitor," Murphy said. "I'm going to continue to use the guy."

Murphy likened holding a candidate responsible for a vendor's client list to an investor being responsible for every company a mutual fund invests in. He added Lucarelli offers reasonable prices and nice work.

Lucarelli is being a good sport about the spotlight on his company, however.

"I was like, 'Wow really?'" he said. "In a sense, it's good publicity of sorts."

Like all of Groce's postings, Sunday's had an agenda — supporting Democratic candidates. If Carter wins the June 12 primary against Jordan Bryngelson, he will face incumbent Democrat Rep. Patsy Knight, supported by Groce. Groce also supports Democratic challenger Miriam Birdsong, gunning for incumbent Republican Dorchester County Councilman Bill Hearn's seat. Hearn is also a client of SMG. 

Groce wrote: "This soft-porn affiliation isn’t extended to the Democratic opponents ... its long portfolio not a single site that a kid couldn’t see."

In his previous post, Groce goes after Carter and Bryngelson as two individuals wrong for District 97. During the GOP Presidential Primary in this state, Groce demonstrated outside some of the debates held, — seeking to run with presidential contender Mitt Romney.

"I don't really care that Rob Groce puts it out there. I don't think it's worth the paper it's written on or the keyboard it's written on," Murphy said. "He's trying to stir up issues because he's got a couple of losing candidates."


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