There will be a lot of this because La Raza , among many other pro-illegal organizations, is out there registering illegals. Get up and get active or you're going to come out living in Aztlan and being deported yourself. -- Faye
Voter fraud case takes a
new twist
Web Posted: 09/12/2007 10:28 PM
CDT
Guillermo X.
Garcia Express-News
Officials involved in a joint federal-state probe say that some of the
dozens of people under investigation in a months-long Bexar County voter fraud
case may be charged with both state and federal crimes.
Federal investigators are to meet this week with local prosecutors to
coordinate the cases being developed and determine who'll face state felony
charges for voting illegally and who will be deported for violating federal
immigration law. No arrests have yet been made.
Authorities said they are anticipating charging some of the undocumented
people alleged to have voted in Bexar County with felony violation of state law
before they are turned over to immigration agents and likely deported.
As the federal portion of the investigation begun in late May winds down,
Bexar County District Attorney Susan Reed will determine how she'll proceed in
the case of the 41 people who allegedly voted, some repeatedly, despite being
non-citizens.
Reed's office will determine who will be charged with felony offenses after a
meeting between Homeland Security Department investigators from Immigration and
Customs Enforcement and Adriana Biggs, Reed's white-collar crime division chief.
"The joint federal-state strategy will likely be that (Bexar County) pursues
felony voter fraud charges, while the parallel federal investigation will focus
on violations related to identity theft, re-entry after deportation and other
violations of (federal) immigration law," ICE spokeswoman Nina Pruneda said
Tuesday.
She said it appears likely that some of the investigation's targets will be
prosecuted in state court on voter fraud charges before facing an immigration
law judge in deportation proceedings.
"They have not shown me what the results of their investigation reveals,"
Biggs said, referring to ICE's ongoing probe. "Once we have determined who is a
citizen and who is not, then we'll proceed with looking at filing state
charges."
The investigation was launched after Bexar County Elections Administrator
Jacque Callanen apparently discovered that undocumented immigrants had voted,
some several times, in more than a dozen local, state and federal elections
between 2001 and early 2007.
She said it didn't appear the illegal voting influenced an election's
outcome.
Callanen earlier this year was updating the county's list of eligible voters
when she discovered some 330 people who should not have been on the rolls
because they weren't citizens.
Callanen compiled the list of names after she determined that they had stated
on juror summons cards that they should be excused because they weren't
citizens.
Pruneda said her agency will process those found to be illegally in the
country for deportation hearings, an administrative proceeding.
Saying the probe was ongoing, Pruneda would not comment on substantive issues
in the investigation, such as how many people have been interviewed by federal
agents or when the federal portion of the investigation would end.
"We are looking at a big pie," Biggs said. "We are going to be carving out
state offenses and determining how to proceed, while the feds will carve out
their portion of the pie related to immigration law."
Biggs said the DA's investigators also would seek to determine whether those
people who said on the jury summons that they were not U.S. citizens were just
seeking to duck jury duty. Citizens who attempt to mislead authorities by
claiming they are non-citizens could face charges of lying on a government
document, she said.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA091307.03B.Voter_Fraud.2f71d87.html
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