Michigan is the gothest place ever because...

[Onyx]

Here in Michigan, even the dead vote.

From Holland to Detroit, votes were cast by 132 dead people; Detroit's voting records are riddled with inaccuracies, casting doubt on elections' integrity

Lisa M. Collins / The Detroit News

W. Edwin Smith / The Detroit News

Voter records show someone as having voted by absentee ballot from this abandoned home in November. A Detroit News review found voter registry rolls packed with dead people and wrong addresses.

Our investigation

To compile its findings, The News reviewed a database of voters who turned out on Nov. 8. We targeted groups of names based on date of birth or other factors.

The voter lists were compared with state databases of individuals serving life sentences in Michigan. The News also went through voter registration cards to verify names and birthdates, and spoke with dozens of voters to confirm their votes.

The News relied on data and analysis from Mark Grebner and Alan Fox of Practical Political Consulting in East Lansing. Grebner and Fox regularly analyze Detroit voter lists, cull errors and sell accurate lists to candidates.

DETROIT -- Fred Douglas Henley would have been 75 years old when the city of Detroit says he walked into a polling precinct and voted on Nov. 8. Henley, however, died the day before the election, and his voting address long has been vacant and boarded up.

Blanche Credit died in 2003. But she's recorded as voting in November, too.

Then there's Michael Hollingsworth, whom the Detroit Department of Elections says voted at his precinct despite serving a life sentence for first-degree murder. And Jennifer Pinkerton is recorded as voting, but she lives in Westland.

It's impossible to say whether Henley, Credit, Hollingsworth and Pinkerton are names used by someone to cast fraudulent votes or whether they simply represent clerical errors. But a Detroit News review of voter and registration files, criminal and death records shows that Detroit's election records are so plagued with mistakes and inconsistencies -- including voter registry rolls packed with as many as 20,000 dead people and roughly 100,000 wrong addresses -- that the overall integrity of Detroit elections is in question.

Detroit, experts say, may be a worst-case example of tainted election records. But the city isn't alone. Across Michigan, 132 people were listed as having voted in November's local elections although they had recently died, says Mark Grebner, whose company, Practical Political Consulting in East Lansing, analyzes voter rolls. About 26 of those were in Detroit, which held by far the largest election, Grebner said.

Problems such as these have prompted Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land to call for major statewide election reform in Michigan, including purging faulty voter rolls in virtually every jurisdiction.

The News' analysis of the city's Nov. 8 election found:

# Ballots recorded as being cast by voters who could not have voted legally because they had died, were serving a criminal sentence or did not live in the city. Felons can vote in Michigan, but not while serving a sentence.

# Nearly 500 names of individuals older than 95 were recorded as having voted on Nov. 8, including nearly 200 over the age of 100 born as early as 1858. While some of the records are correct, the birthdays in most cases were recorded in error.

# Clerical errors so pervasive that it is difficult to determine in many instances who actually voted. Incorrect addresses, wrong birthdates and expired residencies; typographical errors in names and addresses; and garbled spellings are regularly recorded and kept on the city's active voter list. Thousands of properties that are abandoned or vacant remain on the voter rolls.

Among the most common mistakes occur when election workers record a vote under a similar name, or confuse voters with their parents or other relatives.

The News did not review every vote cast, but instead targeted voter records based on several factors, such as the voter's birth year or voting history. Though limited and somewhat random searches were done, each search found voting records in error or highlighted names of voters who in fact could not have voted.

Difficulties in city record-keeping are compounded by the fact that many Detroiters are transient, and many do not have driver's licenses, making data hard to verify. For instance, the city recorded Lawanda Danette Williams as having voted Nov. 8 from her address at 19936 Ilene St. Williams has moved several times since living there.

"I couldn't have voted in Detroit. I was living in Southfield," Williams said. "That house has been vacant since 2002."

Detroit's newly elected clerk, Janice Winfrey, says she's ordered her staff to purge at least 50,000 names from the voter rolls by March; she's targeting bogus addresses as well.

"We've got a lot of cleaning up to do," Winfrey said

More here:

http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?A...METRO/602260301

[The_Dark]

Seems Chicago isn;t the only town where the dead vote. Ever looked up just how many dead people vote in every election there?

[Onyx]

Seems Chicago isn;t the only town where the dead vote. Ever looked up just how many dead people vote in every election there?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Yes, the article did continue on to say that it is a problem everywhere, not just here. It's very long but the link takes you to the rest of it.

I cracked up at the title of the article though.

[phee]

I only vote for dead people.... that's why I voted for Kerry