7 vote fraud claims will advance

The criminal referrals, culled from voter complaints, likely come too late to affect the razor-thin presidential margin.

By SYDNEY P. FREEDBERG

© St. Petersburg Times, published December 5, 2000

State officials said Monday they are ready to start looking for voter fraud, an announcement that came the same day a judge threw out Al Gore's election challenge partly because Democrats failed to prove fraud.

The state Division of Elections will refer seven cases of possible fraud to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement "within the next day or two," said Kristi Bronson, the division's assistant general counsel.

The criminal referrals probably come too late to affect the outcome of one of the most hotly contested presidential races in history.

Leon Circuit Judge N. Sanders Sauls ruled Monday that Gore's campaign failed to "establish any illegality, dishonesty, gross negligence, improper influence, coercion or fraud in the balloting and counting processes."

Bronson said there has been no delay in processing the complaints, made to the state's voter fraud hotline.

But Florida has yet to follow up on some written complaints of voter irregularities, and dozens of other complaints won't be reviewed because telephone callers didn't give specific enough information.

"It's been incredibly busy," Bronson said, adding that she alone reviews the allegations and makes criminal referrals. "There's not a time frame for us to respond" to people who complained.

Asked whether the state needs more staff to process the complaints, she replied: "I can't comment on that."

Under Florida law, voter fraud -- everything from submission of false voter registration information to corruptly influencing voting -- is a third-degree felony, punishable by five years in prison.

Prompted by widespread absentee ballot fraud in a recent Miami mayoral election, the Division of Elections in 1998 set up the hotline -- 1-877-868-3737 -- so citizens can report irregularities.

Telephone clerks in Tallahassee offer to send the callers a two-page complaint form on which they describe the incident and identify possible witnesses and suspects. The Division of Elections then conducts a preliminary investigation. It refers findings to the FDLE and prosecutors in the county where the violation occurred.

Even before the general election on Nov. 7, the fraud hotline began ringing. Callers complained about everything from fictitious citizens registering to vote to political operatives illegally rounding up absentee ballots.

Then, starting on Election Day, the hotline didn't stop ringing. Callers said they suspected bad ballots had been cast by under-age voters, illegal aliens and out-of-staters who voted twice.

Many of the telephone complaints didn't give names, dates, times or specifics. State elections officials didn't act on any of them.

They also discounted some of the 31 written complaints because they were too vague or they lacked credibility.

Several people complained about Palm Beach County's notorious "butterfly ballots," for example, and others accused Vice President Al Gore of being "a party to a massive voter fraud," as John Foss said in his complaint.

"How many illegal voters were counted statewide among the absentee ballots and machine ballots at local precincts," another man wrote. "Why are the supervisors of elections ... unwilling or unable to find these illegal voters? ... Is it not fraud? ... Are these supervisors of elections guilty of misfeasance."

State officials did not give details of the seven complaints they will refer to the FDLE. They sent letters thanking a few people for "taking the time to report a potential case of voter fraud."

But most have yet to receive a response.

Philip Vosburgh, owner of a landscape maintenance firm in Lutz, said he hopes his complaint will be among those thoroughly investigated. He told officials that someone forged his name on an absentee ballot request.

"We were really angry about it," said his wife, K.C. Vosburgh.

And 83-year-old Flora Erver, who voted at a Pompano Beach polling place, accused elections clerks of telling her which hole to punch. Her neighbor, Barbara Thoele, said she was working at the same precinct and saw one of the same clerks make it tough for Democrats to vote.

"You wouldn't believe the atrocity that was going on," said Mrs. Thoele, 62, a retired payroll supervisor for Sony. Neither she nor Mrs. Erver have heard anything since filing their complaints.

"I think the least they could do is come to my house and take a deposition and give me a lie detector test," Mrs. Thoele said.

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