Volume 32 • Number 02 • December 5, 2013
What’s Inside Page 2
Creating ‘hearts full of happy’ in Ethiopia
www.villagerpublishing.com
303-773-8313 • Published every Thursday
A Holiday Tradition
Doty mulling run for secretary of state
Page 4
Downtown Littleton lights up with one candy cane switch
Pages 18-19
Sugarplums highlighted at 24th annual tradition
Don’t Miss:
beats girls, boys • Arapahoe Heritage basketball teams Page 3 Colorado Center opens • History Living West Exhibit
Santa Claus and Wyatt H. light up Downtown Littleton during the city’s 30th annual Littleton Candlelight Walk, Nov. 29.
Photo by Stefan Krusze
Page 13
art show runs • Roosevelt through Dec. 12
Page 23
Index
Page 5..................................Opinion Page 8............................. Classifieds Pages 13-25........ Holiday Gift Guide Page 26......................................digs Pages 28-32..........................Legals
TheVillagerNewspaper @VillagerDenver
DA pleased by fraud investigation Brauchler says wrongful voting not widespread By Peter Jones Even though District Attorney George Brauchler has recently charged several people with misdemeanor voter fraud, that is still a good sign for the election system as far as the chief prosecutor for the 18th Judicial District is concerned. “Voter fraud is not widespread and I think everybody ought to be happy about that,” he said, noting that of the 41 district residents recently investigated for possible fraud, only two will face Brauchler’s prosecution team in court. In total, four people have been charged with a crime. Two immigrants living in Aurora – Tadesse DeGefa from Ethiopia and Vitaliy Grabchenko from Poland – were deemed ineligible to vote. The other two – Michael Michaelis and Carl Blocker – were paid by a nonprofit group that ran voter-registration drives. All four were charged with the misdemeanor “procuring false registration,” even though felony charges could have been
identifying 41 filed, according individuals in to Brauchler. the 18th District “In the interest of justice, who had potenthat was the right tially committhing to do in adted voter fraud. dressing the situOf the 41, 27 ation,” he said. were Demo“We chose not crats and one to proceed on the was a member felonies.” of the Green The charges Party. The reannounced on mainder were Nov. 22 were unaffiliated. the result of an None were Reinvestigation republicans. quested by Sec- DA George Brauchler Brauchler retary of State assigned six Scott Gessler, investigators Voter fraud is not who worked who has made alleged voter more than widespread and fraud a cor300 hours to I think everybody i n v e s t i g a t e nerstone of his tenure. In July, ought to be happy whether any the Republifraud had ocabout that. can official curred. The referred 155 investigation - District Attorney cases of purincluded inGeorge Brauchler ported “nonperson intercitizen voters” views with to 15 district attorneys across the individuals in question, the state. whenever possible. So far, Brauchler is the only “There was very little indistrict attorney to file charges formation provided by the secas a result. retary of state’s office, in part Accompanying Gessler’s let- because they just don’t have ter to Brauchler, a Republican, access to the information that was a packet of information would say whether someone
was or wasn’t eligible to vote,” Brauchler said. Of the 41 submitted names, 21 were determined to be eligible voters, eight could not be located, and 10 were determined to be potentially ineligible to vote. Of that 10, only DeGefa and Grabchenko were charged, in part because the statute of limitations for misdemeanors had passed in some of the cases. According to Brauchler, his office also exercised discretion in not bringing charges “in the interest in justice,” particularly when the individual did not understand the registration process or had been misled about their rights. “Voting is the fundamental building block of everything we do,” Brauchler said. “What I did not want to do is turn this into something that would deter people who were otherwise lawfully voting or eligible to vote. We were very sensitive as to how we approached this.” In the course of investigating the 41 residents, the district attorney brought charges against Michaelis and Blocker, paid registration canvassers for the left-leaning Work for Progress organization. Brauchler’s office Continued on page 2