Woman avoids jail for voting dead mom’s poll 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 in the 2020 normal election.

But 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 against Tracey Kay McKee, 64, is one among only a handful of voter fraud cases from Arizona’s 2020 election which have led to fees, 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 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 before the decide handed down her sentence. McKee said that she was grieving over the loss of her mom and had no intent to influence the end result of the election.

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

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

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

“The one way to stop voter fraud is to bodily go in and punch a poll,” McKee informed the investigator. “I mean, voter fraud goes to be prevalent as long as there’s mail-in voting, for sure. I mean, there’s no means to ensure a good election.

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

Tom Henze, McKee’s lawyer, pointed to dozens of circumstances of voter fraud prosecuted in Arizona over the past decade, many for comparable violations of voting another person’s poll, and said nobody bought jail time in those circumstances. He mentioned agreeing with Lawson that McKee should do 30 days jail time would elevate constitutional problems with equity.

“Merely stated, over an extended time period, in voluminous circumstances, 67 cases, nobody on this state for related cases, in related context ... no one acquired jail time,” Henze stated. “The court didn’t impose jail time at all.”

But Lawson stated jail time was essential as a result of the type of case has modified. While in years previous, most cases concerned individuals voting in two states as a result of they both lived in or had property in each states, in the 2020 election individuals had purchased into Trump’s claims of widespread voter fraud.

“What we’re hearing is voter fraud is on the market,” Lawson informed the judge. “And essentially what we’re seeing here is someone who says ‘Effectively, I’m going to commit voter fraud because it’s an enormous downside and I’m just going to slide in beneath 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 angle you hear in the interview is the perspective that differentiates this case from the other circumstances.”

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

“And if there were proof that this crime was on the rise, and that heightened deterrence may be referred to as for, the courtroom would possibly order jail time,” LaBianca mentioned. “However the file here does not present that this crime is on the rise.

“And abhorrent as it may be for someone like the defendant to attack the legitimacy of our free elections without any evidence, except your own fraud, such statements are usually not unlawful so far as I do know,” the judge continued.