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

PHOENIX (AP) — A decide in Phoenix on Friday sentenced a girl o two years of felony probation, fines and group service for voting her useless mother’s poll 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 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 certainly one of only a handful of voter fraud instances from Arizona’s 2020 election that have led to costs, despite widespread belief 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 but now lives in California, sobbed as she apologized to Maricopa County Superior Courtroom Judge Margaret LaBianca before the judge handed down her sentence. McKee stated that she was grieving over the lack of her mom and had no intent to impact the result of the election.

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

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

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

“The one approach to forestall voter fraud is to bodily go in and punch a poll,” McKee advised the investigator. “I mean, voter fraud is going to be prevalent as long as there’s mail-in voting, for sure. I imply, there’s no approach to make sure a good election.

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

Tom Henze, McKee’s lawyer, pointed to dozens of cases of voter fraud prosecuted in Arizona over the past decade, many for related violations of voting another person’s ballot, and stated nobody obtained jail time in these cases. He stated agreeing with Lawson that McKee should do 30 days jail time would raise constitutional issues of equity.

“Merely stated, over a protracted time period, in voluminous cases, 67 cases, no one in this state for comparable cases, in similar context ... no one got jail time,” Henze stated. “The court didn’t impose jail time at all.”

However Lawson said jail time was necessary because the kind of case has changed. Whereas in years previous, most circumstances concerned folks voting in two states because they both lived in or had property in each states, in the 2020 election people had purchased into Trump’s claims of widespread voter fraud.

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

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

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

“And if there were proof that this crime was on the rise, and that heightened deterrence could also be called for, the courtroom might order jail time,” LaBianca said. “However the report here does not present that this crime is on the rise.

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