07022003 - News Article - Judge primary votes get stamp of approval - Incumbent wins Democratic race; no Republicans in the running - ROBERT CANTRELL

Judge primary votes get stamp of approval
Incumbent wins Democratic race; no Republicans in the running
NWI Times
Jul 2, 2003
nwitimes.com/news/local/judge-primary-votes-get-stamp-of-approval/article_262bdc31-cd12-523e-9742-68334d626a47.html
SCHERERVILLE -- The votes for May's Democratic town judge primary are now official, even the illegal ones.

Lake Superior Court Judge Mary Beth Bonaventura officially certified the vote tally Tuesday, including votes the election panel said Friday were from voters who hadn't lived in Schererville for years.

The 11-vote win of incumbent Town Judge Deborah Riga over Schererville lawyer Kenneth Anderson was in limbo for more than a month while Anderson uncovered the instances of voter fraud apparently perpetuated by a Democratic precinct committeeman.

However, Anderson lost the fight when an election panel rejected his call to toss out mail-in ballots from an east side precinct he said was laden with corruption

Anderson could appeal last week's election panel ruling, but so far he has not decided to do so. And Riga would virtually be guaranteed another four-year term because the Republican Party failed to field an opponent in the upcoming general election.

As town judge, Riga oversees all local traffic tickets and minor crimes.

Anderson showed the election panel four absentee ballots from the east side of town that were allegedly mailed in by three Illinois residents and one Crown Point resident. The voters had moved from Schererville years earlier.

The applications for most of the 10th Precinct absentee ballots, including the illegal ones, where filled out by the same person.

And the election panel said many of those signatures may have been forged. However, the panel voted 2-1 to uphold the results, saying it couldn't discard just some ballots and didn't believe there was enough tampering to throw out the whole east side precinct.

Anderson only received 1 of the 24 mail-in votes in that precinct. Anderson won May's primary at the polls, but Riga came out on to with overwhelming support from absentee voters.