Almost a year after they were reported to have tampered with the ballots of a Homestead family, two workers from the 2013 mayoral campaign of 
hotelier Mark Bell, husband of Miami-Dade Commissioner Lynda Bell — have been arrested on absentee ballot fraud charges.
The Miami-Dade State Attorney Office and the Miami-Dade Police Department announced Thursday the arrests of James Brady — who also happens to be the corresponding secretary of the Miami-Dade Republican Party — and Samuel Jean, who tried to steal the votes of four members of one family last October.
“Criminal activities which aim to undermine our voting process should offend every citizen of Dade County,” State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle said in a statement.
“The actions of my prosecutors and the Miami-Dade Police Department to effectively charge those who try to steal any citizen’s vote show our deep commitment to clean and honest elections,” she added, apparently forgetting about how she let the 2012 Hialeah boletero business slide. “This lengthy investigation aimed to bring all the facts and all of the evidence into the light of day for a sound prosecution.”
Read related story: Who are the Hialeah boletera’s candidates?
And how come we always nab the little guys but never get the real culprits — the candidates or politicians and the campaign consultants who manage to keep their hands clean while they make this fraud happen? Consider:
- Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos “Not So Golden Boy” Gimenez knew nothing about what Hialeah boletera Deisy Cabrera was doing in 2012,
Deisy Cabrera, la boletera, with Sen. Rene Garcia and Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez.activities for which she got a year probation, even though she was video taped going in and out of his office. - County Commissioner Esteban Bovo was un bobo and had no clue that his office aide Anamary Pedrosa was collecting ballots from former Hialeah Mayor Julio Robaina’s uncle in his district office.
- Miami Commissioner Francis Suarez was blissfully unaware that two of the workers from his abandoned mayoral campaign had made online requests for absentee ballots on behalf of voters, which is expressly forbidden as it states on the website.
- Congressman Joe Garcia was out of the loop as his consultant Jeffrey “No Relation” Garcia solicited absentee ballot requests for the 2012 race against former U.S. Rep. David “Nine Lives” Garcia through a computer virus.
This case is no different: Mark Bell, who has said he knew nothing the men’s activities — but who paid James Brady $2,000 for campaign work until he resigned after the incident at the Brockington home, which made news — has not been implicated by authorities.
The investigation began after one of the voters, Robkevia Scott, filed a complaint with the Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics, saying that Brady and Jean had tampered with the ballots of her family members, marking votes for Bell when their choice had been Jeff Porter, who eventually won the race.
In proseuctors’ words, they “fraudulently deprived Ms. Scott and three of her relatives of their right to vote for the candidates of their choice.”
Read related story: First absentee ballot fraud case arises — in Homestead
Betty Brockington told the investigators the same thing she told Ladra last October: That Brady and Jean filled out the ballots for the family after each family member indicated who to vote for. Then they got three of the four of them to sign their envelopes and it was when they went to get Ms. Scott’s signature that she ba
lked. The envelope was sealed and she didn’t get to actually see her votes. She refused to let it go.
Hallelujah, Ms. Scott! Because when she took her ballot back it showed that she had voted for Bell and Councilman Norman Hodge.
“Mr. Jean and Mr. James Brady had chosen the candidates the family had specifically said it opposed in the Nov. 5 election,” the State Attorney’s Office said.
The men left with the other three ballots, but police got them through a search warrant after Scott called the police. They also had the wrong candidates marked — and Jean’s fingerprints all over them.
The men claimed innocence, though the SAO says now that Jean admitted to having “bubbled in” some candidates for someone and said that Brady — who later ran for Florida City Council and lost — did the same.
Each man has been charged with four counts of tampering with an absentee ballot, a third degree felony, and the misdemeanor county violation of carrying more than two ballots at one time.
But, if history is any indication, they won’t do any real time. In fact, they will likely get a year’s probation, during which — and only during which — they will be instructed to stay away from political campaigning.
Maybe it should be a lifetime ban for these people.
Two arrests in Homestead absentee ballot fraud case added by Ladra on
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