Absentee Ballot Fraud Suspected In Mississippi County
by Jason Tolbert ([email protected]) June 19, 2012 10:59 pm 74 views
Mississippi was one of the few counties that had a large turnout during the June runoff. With 3,023 votes cast in the state representative district 55 runoff, it was the largest county in the First Congressional District, while in the regular May primary it was the fifth largest county with only 2,811 votes cast in that race. Monte Hodges won that race with 1,666 votes over Mary Gay Shipley with 1,357. Also, Scott Ellington with 1,745 votes won by a large margin over Clark Hall with 1,149.
It is no surprise the
“According to a news story in today's issue of the Jonesboro Sun newspaper, the Mississippi County Election Commission plans to request an investigation into suspicions of absentee ballot fraud in Mississippi County,” said Ellington in a letter to Col. J.R. Howard of the Arkansas State Police. “Although I have not yet received a file from the Mississippi County Election Commission, please consider this as my formal request for you to assign an investigator to look into this matter.”
“Because my name was on the ballot in both the Democratic primary and runoff elections held on a May 22, 2012 and June 12, 2012, respectively, I will be asking the Circuit Court to appoint a special prosecutor to handle this matter. By copy of this letter, I am notifying Mr. Bob McMahan, the Arkansas Prosecutor Coordinator, of my intention to ask for appointment of a special prosecutor,” continued Ellington.
If you recall, this is the second time Ellington has had to refer an investigation into absentee voter fraud to a special prosecutor. He also referred the investigation of the special election last summer in which Rep. Hudson Hallum of Marion was elected.