Posted on 05/23/2004 3:20:31 PM PDT by SwinneySwitch
In her strained and frail handwriting, Julia Gomez, 73, wrote "Please Do Not Disturb" on a torn piece of notebook paper and stapled it to a curtain in a broken window of her front door.
The sign didn't stop vote-hungry campaign workers earlier this year from repeatedly pestering the ailing woman and her husband, Pedro. They arrived offering to help the two with their mail-in votes for the March primaries.
Not the least interested in voting, Julia shooed several of them away. But they persisted.
Finally, she signed some "papers" in haste, mostly so the campaign workers would leave. Weeks later, she was perplexed and somewhat annoyed to discover that election records show she and her husband had cast ballots.
Who did they vote for? They don't know.
"I don't even know if I'm a Democrat or a Republican," she said.
The Gomezes' votes are products of a simple but effective scheme, aggressive politicking known as ballot chasing or vote brokering, that targets hundreds of vulnerable residents on the South Side who are eligible to vote by mail. Most are 65 and over, or disabled.
Many cannot read or write. Some suffer from Alzheimer's or other debilitating diseases. One couple is hearing impaired and unable to speak without an interpreter. Others are unable to drive. Some are stroke victims or cancer survivors.
Many said they do not keep up with politics and felt pressured to sign the ballots.
They are pursued by people known as coyotes, who promise to deliver a certain number of votes to political candidates, said former candidates who have experienced it firsthand, investigators with the Bexar County District Attorney's Office, and others who admit to running such programs.
The push for mail-in votes can be pivotal in races settled by a difference of a few dozen votes. But for some, the more important issue is the perceived abuse of the elderly.
"Quite frankly, I believe there is no penalty too great for those who abuse our elderly and corrupt their sacred right to vote," said state Rep. Ken Mercer, R-San Antonio, who co-authored a 2003 law aimed at cracking down on illegal ballot-chasing tactics.
The law, which took effect last summer, expanded voter protection, not only prohibiting campaign workers from handling ballots, but also making it illegal to fill out an application for a ballot on behalf of more than one person.
The new law also makes it a Class A misdemeanor to influence or pressure someone for a vote, and stipulates that any assistance must come at the request of the voter.
But ballot chasing continues to thrive in the city's South San School District, near Lackland AFB.
Nowhere is the practice more prevalent than South Side voting precincts 1040 and 1041, where the number of mail-in ballots for the March primaries dwarfed those in other precincts, according to election officials and prosecutors.
It is the same area targeted by the Texas secretary of state's office, which sent an investigator to monitor the most recent school board elections amid allegations of historical fraud.
The number of voters who requested March primary mail-in ballots in South San's precincts 1040 and 1041 was about eight times greater than the average for other precincts in the county.
While an average of only 12 voters requested ballots in other precincts, 103 voters made the requests in precinct 1040, and 94 voters in 1041.
The disparity, coupled with recent ballot applications sent on behalf of 42 dead voters throughout the county, caught the attention of losing candidates and the Bexar County district attorney's office.
White collar crime prosecutor Cliff Herberg said investigators are looking into the scheme, and have pinned down a handful of possible coyotes.
But making such cases stick can be difficult, he said, because most victims don't remember the names of those who came to their home and helped them.
"The problem is they don't remember what the person looked like," he said.
Indeed, many South Side residents can't recall the names of those who came offering them help. But several pointed to a South Side radiator shop and named one of its owners, Edgar Lopez, as the man who handled their ballots.
Others recognized those at their door only as familiar faces from the neighborhood. Some who remain puzzled by the applications filled out on their behalf said no one ever contacted them.
"That is impossible!" was Petra Alvarez's response on learning that she and her husband, Daniel, not only seemingly sought applications for a ballot but voted as well. "Who did we vote for?"
Carmen Medina was equally enraged. Her mother, Dolores Aguilar, is an Alzheimer's patient, but records show she requested an application and voted.
"I am telling you right now, I am not very happy about this," Medina said. "We have a hard time getting her to sign a benefits check."
Herberg said most residents over 65 are either unable or unwilling to testify in court.
But in interviews with dozens of residents in precincts 1040 and 1041, several voters identified Lopez as the person who handled their ballots and put them in the mail.
"I had to kick Edgar out of my house once after he offered me his services," said John Longoria, a former state representative who has been a staple in South Side politics. "Not only did I tell him 'no,' I told him 'hell, no!' I want no part of them."
Lopez, a former candidate for the South San Antonio School District Board and brother to school board member Manuel Lopez, said the voters who accused him of handling their ballots most likely were confused.
Instead, Lopez said he and his sister Sandra knock on doors and merely encourage neighbors to vote, an effort fueled by civic pride for the long-neglected South Side.
"There's no benefit here. I'm a big voter freak," he said. "I just like people to vote. There's nothing wrong with that."
Lopez was adamant that he does not profit from his efforts, and said he does not write on the applications or ballots of those he encourages to vote. He denied offering his services to Longoria, and said he had never heard the term "coyote."
"John Longoria can go to hell," Lopez said.
It's hard to tell whether any vote brokering has swayed recent elections in the area.
In the March primary, Lopez said he supported Robert Tejeda, the longtime Democratic county commissioner who won the race but lost in the subsequent runoff. And while Lopez posted a sign at his radiator shop touting David Leibowitz, who won the Democratic nod for the District 117 Texas House seat, Lopez said his help stopped there.
"I voted for Leibowitz, but I didn't support him," Lopez said.
While investigators have looked into allegations of voter fraud in the South San area before, the only conviction related to such tactics came last year and stemmed from a larger citywide corruption scandal.
Barney Perez, 62, was convicted for his role in a ballot-chasing program he conducted on behalf of former South San School District trustee Denice Jimenez-Garza.
Court records and statements given by Perez's victims mirror actions being described by residents contacted for this report: Perez came to their home, repeatedly harassed them, intimidated them, and took their ballots.
Perez was arrested as part of a 2002 corruption probe at City Hall, Alamo Community College District and several school districts.
Although investigators had zeroed in on 18 possible victims who alleged Perez had stolen their ballots or manipulated them into voting for Jimenez-Garza, Perez was indicted on only four counts of "unlawful assistance of a voter."
Perez lied to a Texas Ranger when he said he wasn't being paid for his efforts, earning him the more serious charge of perjury. Perez struck a deal with prosecutors who dropped the voter fraud charges. Perez was fined $2,000 and sentenced to a year of probation.
But the level of scrutiny elections officials and prosecutors have focused on the murky tactics is questionable. While it's illegal to fill out more than one ballot application on behalf of someone, the county elections office accepted dozens of ballot applications with similar handwriting.
In one case, election officials received four applications from the same woman, each in different handwriting.
Cliff Borofsky, Bexar County election administrator, said pre-filling out more than one ballot application is not illegal, while an official with the Texas secretary of state said it was.
When asked for a clarification, Herberg and other prosecutors had to search the law books to find out what statute applies to assisting a voter with an application.
Voters are bombarded with unsolicited ballot applications that seem to be already filled out for them, according to an examination of hundreds of the applications.
In some cases, campaign workers and coyotes show up at a house with the applications lacking all but a voter's signature, residents said. Some coyotes then repeatedly contact the voters to make sure voters received the ballots.
All that remains is the last visit to ensure voters fill out and send the ballots.
Several residents said they marked off candidates according to Lopez's suggestions.
"He told me that he knows the best people," Genovevo Delgado Rocha said. "I think that he knows better who the good ones are."
Like Rocha, Amadita Vasquez said she trusted Lopez to pick out the candidates for them. Lopez is a visible fixture in the neighborhood, a political activist as well as someone who fixes their cars and performs state car inspections for them.
"He helps me all the time. We don't know much, and he tells me this and this and this and I say, 'OK,'" Vasquez said.
Lopez's neighbors Mariano and Herlinda Aleman said they signed empty ballots for Lopez, who took the ballots before they marked their votes.
"I remember telling my daughter, 'You know what? I don't think I voted,'" Herlinda said.
In the case of Barney Perez, prosecutors obtained photographs of him following a mailman. The man taking the pictures, a campaign worker for an opposing candidate, scuffled with Perez after snapping shots of Perez swiping one of the unopened envelopes from a mailbox, court records show.
Lopez said he is well aware of the law, and takes pains not to break it. He said he merely ensures that voters place their ballots in the mailbox, and offers them stamps.
"You're not supposed to get them in your hand," he said. "I'll walk with you to the mailbox, but I won't take them."
Lopez said that in light of all the controversy, he plans to end his efforts to help his neighbors with mail-in ballots.
"It's too much work. Too many people asking questions," he said. "From now on, we're bringing people to the polls."
--------------irodrig@express-news.net
They corrupt all our votes, Ken. Shooting them would be too nice!
Dead or alive?
I doubt anybody on this board is surprised. My only surprise came at the one Democratic pol (Mr. Longoria) who told Lopez to get lost. A good man in the other camp is a rare thing to find these days.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
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