Woman avoids jail for voting dead mother’s ballot in Arizona

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

However the decide 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 among just a handful of voter fraud circumstances from Arizona’s 2020 election which have led to costs, regardless of widespread perception amongst 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 Court docket Choose Margaret LaBianca before the choose handed down her sentence. McKee said that she was grieving over the lack of her mother and had no intent to affect the result of the election.

“Your Honor, I would like to apologize,” McKee instructed LaBianca. “I don’t need to make the excuse for my conduct. What I did was improper and I’m prepared to simply accept the implications handed down by the courtroom.”

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

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

“The only way to stop voter fraud is to physically go in and punch a poll,” McKee advised the investigator. “I imply, voter fraud goes 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 imagine that this was a good election,” she continued. “I do believe there was loads of voter fraud.”

Tom Henze, McKee’s attorney, pointed to dozens of cases of voter fraud prosecuted in Arizona over the previous decade, many for similar violations of voting someone else’s poll, and said no one received jail time in those cases. He mentioned agreeing with Lawson that McKee should do 30 days jail time would increase constitutional problems with equity.

“Simply said, over a long time frame, in voluminous circumstances, 67 cases, no person in this state for similar cases, in related context ... no one received jail time,” Henze said. “The court docket didn’t impose jail time in any respect.”

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

“What we’re listening to is voter fraud is out there,” Lawson advised the choose. “And primarily what we’re seeing 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 just going to slide in beneath 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 in any respect,” he stated. “And I think the attitude you hear within the interview is the perspective that differentiates this case from the other cases.”

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

“And if there have been proof that this crime was on the rise, and that heightened deterrence may be called for, the courtroom may order jail time,” LaBianca mentioned. “However the report here doesn't show that this crime is on the rise.

“And abhorrent as it might be for someone like the defendant to attack the legitimacy of our free elections with none evidence, besides your personal fraud, such statements aren't illegal as far as I do know,” the choose continued.