The private detective that uncovered absentee ballot fraud in the Miami-Dade Augu
st 2012 election has nabbed yet another person committing electoral fraud — this time selling “access” to elderly voters, which we have to interpret as access to absentee ballots.
Joe Carillo told Ladra Thursday he would give details Friday about his latest sting operation, in which he gets a woman to allegedly offer access to elderly public housing residents. She also reveals some of her clients and declines a new one because she is working for the opposition. The clients are all judicial candidates, according to a list that she, for whatever reason, voluntarily provided: Elena Tauler, Yolly Roberson, Wendell Graham, Luis Perez-Medina, Lizzet Martinez, Rosy Aponte and Marcia del Rey. And that is her order, not mine.
But there may be other candidates, Carrillo said.
It’s been four years since Carrillo brought wide exposure to a longtime secret election tool used by the savvyist and most ethically challenged campaign strategists: la boletera.
These ballot brokers collect absentee or mail-in ballots, mostly from elderly and public housing residents, for a fee. Carrillo, and later the Miami-Dade Police public corruption unit, tracked one of them going in and out of Mayor Carlos Gimenez‘s Hialeah campaign office in 2012. Deisy Penton de Cabrera was later stopped with dozens of absentee ballots on her, a clear violation of the law. She was arrested, but after the case was transferred to Broward because of a conflict of interest (Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle had hired the consultant who worked with Deisy), she was let go with nothing more than a slap on the wrist.
Read related story: Boletera’s notebooks may script AB fraud cover-up
Worse: There was never a follow up into the three notebooks of names, including judicial candidates, for whom Cabrera was paid to pick up ballots. And the detectives who were in charge of that investigation were disbanded and sent to different posts when the public corruption unit was dismantled in 2014. So, basically, there’s nobody watching the store today. (Well, except for Joe Carrillo.)
Nothing happened either to Sergio “El Tio” Robaina — and just guess whose uncle he is — 
even though he was arrested for delivering hundreds of absentee ballots to the district office of Miami-Dade Commissioner Esteban Bovo, who didn’t get so much as a slap on the wrist. That whole thing — including the commissioner’s aide who was caught transporting the ballots in the trunk of her car from his office to the mail house — was just swept under the rug.
Dotty Vazquez didn’t get a slap on the wrist either. Oh, you never heard of her because she never got caught. So, instead, she got a job at the mayor’s office. She is now one of 12 mayor’s aides (and yes, that sounds excessive, but that’s another story).
A known boletera — just ask any number of Hialeah former electeds — Dotty was paid at least $10,000
from Mayor Gimenez’s Common Sense Now PAC in 2012 for “consulting,” according to campaign finance reports. And we all know she’s not a consultant. That’s just one of the many code words used for boletera work. Here’s Dotty pictured (right) with Gimenez at the same 2012 Hialeah campaign opening that Cabrera attended. Since at least 2014, however, she has been a $36,000-a-year mayor’s aide. Ladra has to wonder how she uses her skill set there. Or how she spends her days. Especially this week, after absentee ballots were mailed out to voters. A source who works at the county says she is called an “outreach coordinator” and spends a lot of her time at senior centers. But of course! She is sowing the seeds. We know she spends Saturdays at honk and wave campaign events with Transit Director Alice Bravo, but that’s another story. And let’s face it, both their jobs depend on Gimenez staying the boss.
The point is that the State Attorney’s Office doesn’t have to look too far to find boleteros. And, obviously, all they have to do is follow some of these people for a few days or stage a simple sting. But nooooo. It takes, again, a private citizen outraged with the blatant fraud going on to try to put a stop to it.
Read related story: AB fraud PI is a hero until proven otherwise
Carrillo said he and attorney Rick Yabor had received information about the woman selling 
“access” to voters at Robert King High, an elderly public housing building in Little Havana, about four weeks ago. They immediately contacted the state attorney’s office and were told that they would initiate an undercover operation only if they got a current candidate involved. Can you imagine that? Are they that short-staffed at public corruption or are they just lazy? Carrillo said he and Yabor met with several candidates and none would participate in the sting for fear of political retribution.
So they set up their own undercover operation and sent investigators to meet with the woman. “And the target offered to grant ‘special access’ to elderly voters for a fee,” Carrillo said in a press release advising of a press conference Friday. “The target advised investigators of candidates that she was ‘helping.’ The target further advised 
that she refused to help certain other candidates because she had been paid by their opponents.”
Carillo would not provide Ladra with any more details. He would not tell her whether or not Gimenez or Fernandez Rundle are implicated yet again. But at least two of the judicial candidates hired Al Lorenzo, the same consultant who was tainted in the 2012 AB fraud scandal. Carrillo said more details would come out Friday.
Apparently, he is giving the State Attorney’s Office time to move on their own investigation. Carrillo said he told prosecutors about his findings on Tuesday. Investigators worked with Diario las Americas to produce the evidence. Perhaps this press conference is intended to pressure prosecutors. It certainly should at the very least embarrass them that a couple of P.I.s can do a better job, again, than the public corruption unit at the biggest county in the state.
Because right now, the message sent to boleteras is that they don’t get punished in Miami-Dade. They get $36,000-a-year county jobs.
Boleteras alive and well — and working in the mayor’s office added by Ladra on
View all posts by Ladra →
