Posts Tagged ‘Corruption’

The disappearance of some absentee ballots, picked up under unusual circumstances, has raised some serious questions.

BY LAURA FIGUEROA AND SCOTT HIAASEN

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/campaign-2008/story/740834.html

Three Hialeah voters say they had an unusual visitor at their homes last week: a man who called himself Juan, offering to help them fill out their absentee ballots and deliver them to the elections office.

The voters, all supporters of Democratic congressional candidate Raul Martinez, said they gave their ballots to the man after he told them he worked for Martinez. But the Martinez campaign said he doesn’t work for them.

Juan ”told me not to worry, that they normally collected all the ballots and waited until they had a stack big enough to hand-deliver to the elections department,” said voter Jesus Hernandez, 73. ‘He said, `Don’t worry. This is not going to pass through the mail to get lost.’ ”

Hernandez said he worries his ballot was stolen or destroyed. He and two other voters told The Miami Herald that the man was dispatched by a woman caller who also said she worked for Martinez. But the phone number cited by the voters traces back to a consultant working for Martinez’s rival, Republican congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart.

Martinez’s campaign manager, Jeff Garcia, has asked the Miami-Dade state attorney’s office to investigate.

Garcia has also spent the past week investigating the complaints, taking sworn statements from the three voters and mounting an ameteur sting operation at the home of an 84-year-old voter to try to catch the culprit. (more…)

10.05.2008
By Dan Christensen
The Miami Herald

Congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart has procured millions in federal funding to benefit a small Miami-Dade defense-contracting group that has donated tens of thousands of dollars to his political campaign and that of his brother, fellow U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart.

Medley contractors Locust USA and Mark Two Engineering began contributing to the Diaz-Balarts’ campaigns and political action committees in 2001, the year Locust secured its first small defense contract. Through this year, those contributions totaled more than $67,000.

Locust was awarded $20.8 million in Pentagon research and development contracts from 2001-2007, federal contracting records show.

At least 44 percent, $9.2 million, came through Congressional earmarks sponsored by Lincoln Diaz-Balart, The Miami Herald found. The largest — $3.7 million — came in 2006.

”My work on behalf of Locust USA is meant to add jobs to our local economy by putting our community at the forefront of military technology development,” Diaz-Balart wrote in reply to Herald questions. (more…)