Lady avoids jail for voting dead mom’s ballot in Arizona

PHOENIX (AP) — A decide in Phoenix on Friday sentenced a lady o two years of felony probation, fines and group service for voting her dead mom’s poll in Arizona within the 2020 general election.

However the judge rejected a prosecutor’s request that she serve not less than 30 days in jail as a result of she lied to investigators and demanded that they hold these committing voter fraud accountable.

The case towards Tracey Kay McKee, 64, is one in all only a handful of voter fraud instances from Arizona’s 2020 election that have led to costs, despite widespread perception amongst many supporters of former President Donald Trump that there was widespread voter fraud that led to his loss in Arizona and other battleground states.

McKee, who was from Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale however now lives in California, sobbed as she apologized to Maricopa County Superior Court docket Choose Margaret LaBianca before the choose handed down her sentence. McKee stated that she was grieving over the lack of her mother and had no intent to impression the result of the election.

“Your Honor, I wish to apologize,” McKee advised LaBianca. “I don’t want to make the excuse for my conduct. What I did was incorrect and I’m ready to just accept the consequences handed down by the courtroom.”

Both McKee and her mother, Mary Arendt, have been registered Republicans, although she was not asked if she voted for Trump. Arendt died on Oct. 5, 2020, two days before early ballots were mailed to voters.

Assistant Lawyer General Todd Lawson performed a tape of McKee being interviewed by an investigator together with his workplace the place she mentioned there was rampant voter fraud and denied that she had signed and returned her mom’s poll.

“The one strategy to stop voter fraud is to physically go in and punch a ballot,” McKee informed the investigator. “I mean, voter fraud goes to be prevalent as long as there’s mail-in voting, for positive. I imply, there’s no manner to ensure a fair election.

“And I don’t believe that this was a good election,” she continued. “I do imagine there was loads of voter fraud.”

Tom Henze, McKee’s attorney, pointed to dozens of cases of voter fraud prosecuted in Arizona over the past decade, many for similar violations of voting someone else’s ballot, and stated nobody got jail time in those instances. He mentioned agreeing with Lawson that McKee should do 30 days jail time would raise constitutional problems with fairness.

“Merely said, over an extended time frame, in voluminous cases, 67 circumstances, no person in this state for comparable cases, in similar context ... nobody bought jail time,” Henze stated. “The court didn’t impose jail time at all.”

But Lawson said jail time was important as a result of the type of case has modified. While in years past, most circumstances involved people voting in two states because they both lived in or had property in both states, in the 2020 election individuals had bought into Trump’s claims of widespread voter fraud.

“What we’re hearing is voter fraud is on the market,” Lawson told the judge. “And basically what we’re seeing right here is someone who says ‘Nicely, I’m going to commit voter fraud because it’s a giant drawback and I’m just going to slip in below the radar. And I’m going to do it as a result of everybody else is doing it and I can get away with it.’

“I don’t subscribe to that at all,” he said. “And I feel the perspective you hear in the interview is the perspective that differentiates this case from the opposite circumstances.”

LaBianca said that while she agreed with Lawson, ordering jail time would give McKee what she informed the investigator what she needed: going after people who dedicated voter fraud.

“And if there were evidence that this crime was on the rise, and that heightened deterrence could also be known as for, the court may order jail time,” LaBianca said. “However the document here does not show that this crime is on the rise.

“And abhorrent as it may be for somebody just like the defendant to attack the legitimacy of our free elections without any proof, except your personal fraud, such statements will not be unlawful as far as I do know,” the choose continued.