-Caveat Lector-
"At least 445 Florida felons voted illegally on Nov. 7, ... nearly
75 percent of the illegal ballots discovered by The Herald were
cast by registered Democrats."
445 X .75 = 333
The Miami Herald
Friday, December 1, 2000
Since 1868, it has been illegal for felons to cast ballots in
Florida.
Hundreds of felons cast votes illegally
BY DAVID KIDWELL, PHIL LONG AND GEOFF DOUGHERTY
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
At least 445 Florida felons voted illegally on Nov. 7, casting
another cloud over a disputed presidential election already mired
in legal challenges, a Herald investigation has found.
The tainted votes -- found in a review of nearly half a million
votes cast in 12 Florida counties -- provide evidence that the
presidential race was influenced by thousands of ineligible
voters. Nearly six million voters in Florida's 67 counties cast
ballots.
They also point out the failure of Florida's multimillion-dollar
effort to prevent election fraud by eliminating dead and illegal
voters from the registration rolls.
``This just goes to show that the most expensive voting equipment
in the world is worthless when the voting rolls are that
filthy,'' said Deborah Phillips, president of the nonprofit
Voting Integrity Project in Arlington, Va. ``It's just an
invitation to lower the integrity of the election.''
TWO KEY COUNTIES
The majority of the illegal votes -- 330 -- were cast in Palm
Beach and Duval counties, which decided not to participate in the
statewide effort this year to purge felons, dead people and
double registrants from the rolls.
Elections supervisors in those counties argue the state database
compiled by the Florida Division of Elections, at a price of $4
million, was peppered with errors and mismatches.
Even so, most other counties -- including Miami-Dade and Broward
-- used it to scrub thousands of ineligible voters from the
rolls, as required by state law.
LEGAL CHALLENGES
The lapses in Palm Beach and Duval counties could become
significant if Democrats win any of their legal challenges and
take the narrow lead away from Republican Texas Gov. George W.
Bush. Nearly 75 percent of the illegal ballots discovered by The
Herald were cast by registered Democrats.
The votes could be seized upon by the Bush campaign to argue that
a large number of illegal votes were probably cast for his
opponent, outweighing the effect of any recount.
``It's a very powerful argument,'' said Robert Jarvis, a law
professor at Nova Southeastern University.
Since 1868, it has been illegal for felons to cast ballots in
Florida, one of 14 states with an arduous paperwork process for
felons to have their rights restored. The provision has prompted
a federal lawsuit by civil rights groups who allege it is
discriminatory against blacks.
The Herald found 62 robbers, 56 drug dealers, 45 killers, 16
rapists and seven kidnappers who cast ballots. At least two who
voted are pictured on the state's online registry of sexual
offenders.
`TON OF US'
``There are a ton of us out there,'' said William Herman, 37, of
Lake Worth, sentenced to five years in prison in 1989 for
negligent homicide with a motor vehicle. ``It shouldn't be that
way, but when they give you a voter registration card, hey, what
are you supposed to do?
Clarence Eden Williams, 77, of Pahokee, also voted. His picture
is posted on the state registry of sexual offenders for his
crimes against children. His son was surprised his father cast a
ballot.
``He's got Alzheimer's, and he can't even carry on a conversation
anymore,'' said Clarence Williams III.
The Herald review included counties where voter lists could be
obtained -- about 8 percent of the 5.9 million votes cast on Nov.
7. It encompassed all votes cast in Palm Beach and Pasco
counties, most votes cast in Duval County, and only absentee
votes in Miami-Dade, Broward, Lee, Leon, Hillsborough, Clay and
the Panhandle counties of Escambia, Okaloosa and Bay.
FINDING FELONS
To find felony voters, The Herald compared a list of voters in
those counties with a Department of Corrections database listing
felons who had served at least a year in prison. If the pattern
found in the study is the same statewide, more than 5,000 felons
likely cast illegal ballots.
Duval County had the highest turnout among convicted felons with
at least 235 voting illegally.
Elections Supervisor John Stafford, like several other elections
officials, said he didn't trust a purge list provided by the
state Elections Division in Tallahasse.
``We weren't going to take that chance and delete everybody,''
said John Stafford, Duval's election supervisor. ``We'd have been
in a world of trouble. It is almost a joke because there are so
many errors in it.''
In fact, one of Stafford's employees found her husband's name on
the list of felons by mistake, she said.
Stafford said his office sent out a letter to felons identified
on the state database, and were inundated by telephone calls from
irate residents -- some who said they had been misidentified as
felons and others angry they'd been disenfranchised over
decades-old crimes. ```We're talking about a crime when I was
19,'' said Theron McDaniel, of Jacksonville, convicted of dealing
in stolen property in 1977. ``I'm 42 years old and they're still
holding that over me?
``As a matter of fact I'm a deacon in my church,'' he said. ``I
don't know anybody who's perfect in this life.''
PURGE IGNORED
Palm Beach County Elections Supervisor Theresa LePore ignored the
state purge list after a well-publicized error that mistakenly
identified thousands of Floridians guilty of misdemeanors as
having felony convictions. She declined comment for this article.
Herald staff writers William Yardley, Sara Olkon, Jason Grotto
and Tina Cummings contributed to this report.
=================================================================
Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, YHVH, TZEVAOT
FROM THE DESK OF:
*Michael Spitzer* <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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