Woman suspected of forging petition names

LEWISTON – Authorities are searching for a Lewiston woman suspected of falsifying signatures gathered for a political petition in support of allowing gambling machines at horse tracks.

Nez Perce County Prosecutor Dan Spickler said the paid signature gatherer forged the signatures of as many as 200 county voters.

Prosecutors in Ada and Canyon counties are investigating similar cases for the same initiative, which was withdrawn in April.

“The fact that somebody attempted this is just intolerable,” said County Clerk Patty O. Weeks, who tipped Spickler’s office to the alleged fraud.

Spickler said he believes a $1.25-per-signature bounty paid by the gambling interests backing the initiative motivated the 46-year-old woman to falsify the petitions.

She faces four felonies related to falsifying petitions, each of which carries sentences of up to two years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

Authorities have been unable to locate the woman. Court records indicate she also failed to appear for sentencing on an unrelated charge of felony grand theft in October.

“We’d certainly like to talk to this person,” Spickler said. “When you see it happened in more places, you wonder if it wasn’t individual choices.” Both Spickler and Weeks said the use of paid signature gatherers for initiatives should prompt public concern.

“That seems to be the new thing in Idaho; instead of having people dedicated to a cause, you have people with big pockets paying people to get signatures,” Weeks said.

Weeks became suspicious after reviewing the near-perfect petitions for the initiative, which were turned in in April.

State law requires 41,000 valid signatures before an initiative can be placed on the ballot, and those who sign the petition must be registered voters and list their address.

Normally, a number of signatures on each 20-name petition must be discarded because the signers write down a different address than the one at which they registered to vote, or because they are not registered to vote at all.

The suspected petitions included a voter for every address on entire blocks, some of whom supposedly signed on Easter, Weeks said.

“That’s a giveaway – everybody being home, especially on Easter,” Spickler said. “Not everybody’s going to be home, and not everybody’s going to sign the petition.”

Spickler asked Nez Perce County sheriff’s deputies to investigate, and he says almost all of the people questioned denied signing the petition.

A comparison of the signatures on the petitions and voter registration cards did not match, he added.

The initiative would have allowed the horse racing tracks to install the same sort of video lottery machines used by Indian casinos.