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

PHOENIX (AP) — A choose in Phoenix on Friday sentenced a woman o two years of felony probation, fines and neighborhood service for voting her lifeless mother’s ballot in Arizona within the 2020 general election.

However the judge rejected a prosecutor’s request that she serve a minimum of 30 days in jail because she lied to investigators and demanded that they maintain these committing voter fraud accountable.

The case towards Tracey Kay McKee, 64, is considered one of just a handful of voter fraud instances from Arizona’s 2020 election which have led to charges, despite widespread belief among many supporters of former President Donald Trump that there was widespread voter fraud that led to his loss in Arizona and different battleground states.

McKee, who was from Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale but now lives in California, sobbed as she apologized to Maricopa County Superior Courtroom Decide Margaret LaBianca earlier than the choose handed down her sentence. McKee mentioned that she was grieving over the loss of her mother and had no intent to impression the result of the election.

“Your Honor, I want to apologize,” McKee instructed LaBianca. “I don’t wish to make the excuse for my behavior. What I did was fallacious and I’m ready to simply accept the implications handed down by the court docket.”

Each McKee and her mother, Mary Arendt, had been registered Republicans, though she was not requested if she voted for Trump. Arendt died on Oct. 5, 2020, two days earlier than early ballots have been mailed to voters.

Assistant Attorney Normal Todd Lawson played a tape of McKee being interviewed by an investigator together with his office where she mentioned there was rampant voter fraud and denied that she had signed and returned her mother’s poll.

“The one technique to prevent voter fraud is to bodily go in and punch a ballot,” McKee instructed the investigator. “I imply, voter fraud goes to be prevalent as long as there’s mail-in voting, for sure. I mean, there’s no approach to make sure a fair election.

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

Tom Henze, McKee’s legal professional, pointed to dozens of instances of voter fraud prosecuted in Arizona over the previous decade, many for comparable violations of voting someone else’s poll, and stated no one got jail time in these cases. He said agreeing with Lawson that McKee ought to do 30 days jail time would increase constitutional issues of equity.

“Simply acknowledged, over a long time frame, in voluminous cases, 67 circumstances, no one on this state for comparable circumstances, in comparable context ... nobody bought jail time,” Henze said. “The court didn’t impose jail time in any respect.”

However Lawson said jail time was important as a result of the type of case has changed. While in years previous, most instances concerned people voting in two states as a result of they either lived in or had property in each states, in the 2020 election people had bought into Trump’s claims of widespread voter fraud.

“What we’re hearing is voter fraud is on the market,” Lawson instructed the decide. “And basically what we’re seeing here is someone who says ‘Well, I’m going to commit voter fraud as a result of it’s a giant problem and I’m just going to slide in under the radar. And I’m going to do it as a result of all people else is doing it and I can get away with it.’

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

LaBianca mentioned that whereas she agreed with Lawson, ordering jail time would give McKee what she advised the investigator what she wished: going after people who dedicated voter fraud.

“And if there were evidence that this crime was on the rise, and that heightened deterrence may be referred to as for, the court may order jail time,” LaBianca said. “But the file right here does not show that this crime is on the rise.

“And abhorrent as it might be for somebody like the defendant to assault the legitimacy of our free elections without any evidence, besides your individual fraud, such statements are usually not unlawful as far as I know,” the choose continued.