WFOY commentator: fugitive from justice

51 year old Richard Lester Senninger was arrested yesterday and booked in the St. Johns County jail — facing charges that he is a fugitive from justice in Michigan for larceny and theft.

Senninger is better known as “Rick Wright”, a conservative political commentator who features several regular contributors on the program “Outside the Wire” on WFOY 1240 radio in St. Augustine.

On her weekday talk show this morning, Kris Phillips, owner of WFOY, took time to set the record straight that she is a “victim” of Senninger as well. Phillips, who said that after fifteen years in broadcasting, the last two of which were here in St. Augustine, this has been an eventful week — it’s the first time she has taken anyone to small claims court for not paying her and now this business deal resulting in the arrest of Senninger.

Phillips claims that she was selling Senninger local radio air time and the use of her studio to produce his program as well as satellite time for syndication. Senninger was past due in his payments to her, according to comments made during her talk show this morning. Phillips says she pressed Senninger for payment on Monday and became suspicious when he offered her payment the following day — using someone else’s credit card.

Phillips is no stranger to controversy. She and her husband, Kevin Leslie Geddings, a radio announcer also known on air as “Kevin Leslie”, bought WFOY-AM and WAOC-AM in St. Augustine in May 2006. Geddings was sentenced in May of last year to four years in prison and fined $25,000 in North Carolina after he was found guilty by a jury of committing five counts of mail fraud.