08062004 - News Article - Key indictments expected today - News conference could announce latest work of vote fraud task force

Key indictments expected today 
News conference could announce latest work of vote fraud task force 

Post-Tribune (IN)
August 6, 2004

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The first indictments in a joint county, state and federal voter fraud task force are expected today. 

U.S. Attorney Joseph Van Bokkelen has called a news conference with Indiana Attorney General Steve Carter and Lake County Prosecutor Bernard Carter to unveil the latest round of indictments. They will make the announcement at the federal courthouse in downtown Hammond. 

The two Carters formed their own task force in 2003, after a contentious primary season that included charges of fraud and corruption in the Democratic primaries for Schererville town judge and East Chicago mayor . 

The narrow victory of incumbent Schererville Town Judge Deborah Riga was overturned by a county judge. Former East Chicago City Councilman George Pabey continues to contest the re-election of Mayor Robert Pastrick . The case awaits a decision of the Indiana Supreme Court. 

Before the state grand jury was suspended in favor of federal probe, investigators were looking at electioneering within the Serbian-American community in Schererville, including the manipulation of absentee ballots in the judge race. 

The investigation resulted in a 10-count state grand jury indictment of Robert "Bosko" Grkinich of Schererville for alleged voter fraud in his town's primary. 

A host of East Chicago election fraud charges were documented in July 2003 as part of a landmark ruling by Special Judge Steve E. King in Pabey vs. Pastrick . 

Initially, VanBokkelen had said been publicly reluctant to add the 2003 Lake County elections to a long list of fraud and corruption cases being investigated by a federal grand jury impaneled in 2002, in what his office has dubbed Operation Restore Public Integrity. 

Then in January, he and the two Carters held news conference to announce a unified effort. Two weeks later, federal investigators began questioning officials in North Township, including political power broker Robert Cantrell. 

Prior to the May primary, Woodrow "Pete" Rancifer and Dorothy Johnson, both township poor relief recipients, told the Lake County Elections and Registration Board that Cantrell paid them to enter the East Chicago city clerk race. 

Though Cantrell is not expected to be indicted today, in recent weeks agents for the task force have interviewed the staff in North Township about Cantrell's role in the elections and in the township's East Chicago office. 

The staff members testified in the Pabey case that Cantrell boasted of providing fraudulent absentee votes in the primary and also testified they saw him perform little or no work for his township salary of $38,844. 

While today is expected to bring the first round of charges in the three-pronged task force, the attorney general may have upstaged the event Tuesday, when he announced that he will bring civil racketeering charges against Pastrick and 26 other defendants in East Chicago. 

This was the first time Pastrick had been personally linked to the long list of probes that swirl around the decaying steel town. Prior to the case based on the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, the long-time mayor of East Chicago had remained an unnamed, unindicted co-conspirator in the criminal probe of a 1999 concrete-for-votes scandal that has led to the criminal indictment of 12 people, including several high ranking city officials. 

Operation Restore Public Integrity includes continued investigation into the sidewalk scheme.