It is time for Tony Payton to do the right thing, and withdraw from his bid for the 179th District. Corruption cannot be tolerated by anyone!
Payton signed off as the circulator on a petition that had FIVE DEAD PEOPLE signed on, and his OPPONENT'S MOTHER. His opponent's mother has already said she didn't sign the petition.
This is clearly a kitchen table job, something that the Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett has recently taken very seriously. Although this issue is starting to draw significant attention, it appears that his friends are working hard to silence any criticism.
HOW IS THIS ACCEPTABLE? Has anyone heard a reasonable explanation for dead people signed on? Or an opponent's mother? How is this different than the Bebko-Jones case? Also, since these same names were on the petition for state rep. as well as for delegate for Obama, this is both a state and federal issue?
So, where is the outrage? Where is the call for an explanation?
The charges in the other petition fraud case
This is from the Attorney General's website...has he started an investigation into the Payton Affair?
""State legislators are responsible for protecting the public trust and ensuring that they uphold the law and abide by it," Corbett said. "Nobody is above the law in Pennsylvania, and that includes our elected officials. "
Bebko-Jones is charged with four counts of criminal conspiracy to commit false swearing, one count of forgery, one count of tampering with public records or information, one count of false swearing, one count of criminal conspiracy to commit forgery, one count of criminal conspiracy to commit tampering with public records or information, one count of false signatures and statements and nomination petitions and papers, one count of criminal conspiracy to commit false signatures and statements to nomination statements and papers, one count of nomination petitions; fraudulent filing and one count of criminal conspiracy to commit nomination petitions; fraudulent filing.
Fiolek is charged with four counts of false swearing, one count of forgery, one count of tampering with public records or information, one count of criminal conspiracy to commit forgery, one count of criminal conspiracy to commit tampering with public records or information, one count of criminal conspiracy to commit false swearing, one count of false signatures and statements and nomination petitions and papers, one count of criminal conspiracy to commit false signatures and statements to nomination statements and papers, one count of nomination petitions; fraudulent filing and one count of criminal conspiracy to commit nomination petitions; fraudulent filing."
To be clear
I've asked this of other folks attacking Payton for this. By the same token, would you also ask Larry Farnese and Tommy Blackwell to drop out? Whats good for the goose is good for the gander.
-Sean
MrLuigi, my cat, actually only types half as badly as I do.
Sure, Blackwell should go too!
Sean,
I'm not as familiar with those cases. My understanding is that there is a KEY difference here. Payton signed on that HE was the circulator of those fraudulent petitions -- not a proxy or staffer.
I don't believe that was the case with Farnese, and hasn't a judge already ruled that he can stay on the ballot, etc.
I have heard that Blackwell has bad petitions, and if it is similar to Payton, then yes, he should step aside as well.
It surprises me how on this site everyone has gotten quiet about Payton. I know he's loved here, but shouldn't the same rules apply to all? I can only imagine if this was a Carol Campbell or a John Dougherty -- the cries for "out with the machine" and in with the new fresh blood, wouldn't end. Yet when Payton does it, crickets......
I hope there are consistent standards for all, and those who call themselves progressive will decry falsified or forged signatures. Big corruption always starts with little corruption.
We have a bingo
Yeah, I think you have to get to "big corruption" first before you get the chorus of outrage. Just sayin'.
Otherwise, I think we have talked out the various problems with signatures long before now.
Chirp Chirp
More Chirp
I hear your point, but I don't understand.. Based on what, do you think the Attorney General will not look into this? And why do you think a judge would not find Payton guilty? He did sign as circulator, and get the state and federal petitions notarized, right? The signatures are fraudulent, right?
So, if the dead people didn't sign, and his opponent's mother didn't sign, then who forged the signatures? And if as circulator you're warranting that you collected all those signatures, when you clearly didn't, or you faked them, you don't think there should be any penalty?
I just don't understand your logic on this.
Who did it
Somebody Payton hired to collect signatures - which was only deemed a no-no (signing for sigs you did not oversee collecting yourself) by the courts a few years ago (which Payton might not have been aware of) - and something the AG is very unlikely to press charges on by itself, particularly if and when it comes to that Payton is cooperative with the AG's investigation.
-Sean
MrLuigi, my cat, actually only types half as badly as I do.
Payton Did it
Now I'm really confused. Payton signed off on the affidavit, and on the petitions that HE circulated them.
So the "Who" is "He".
Can you cite a specific case where the AG thought it was not a big deal for someone to lie on an affidavit? And futher more, if we trust that he was honest and saying he was circulator, and that he did circulate, how did dead people and forged signitures show up?
Or, are you suggesting that he was not the circulator, but lied on the affidavit? If so, who then was the real circulator?
Either way, itsn't this a huge breach of ethics and standards? The exact reason people were throwing folks out of Harrisburg for the past year? The reason Michael Nutter's message reasonated so stongly here?
Or, it it more Orwelian, where some animals are more equal than others, and if it is someone who previously had good progressive credentials, than corruption and dishonesty can be tolerated for some greater purpose. That's a little too "Shelley's Heart" for me!
If I misunderstood what you were saying, please clarify.
Couple things
1. Re Farnese: you are right the candidate did not sign the affidavit as a circulator on the forgeries, just his campaign manager and campaign treasurer
2. Criminal law and election law for good reason move at a different pace. If the AG presses criminal charges (and from what I hear its not just the Guy Lewis people who are looking at that idea), nothing is likely to happen on it in terms of formal charges for another two years in the next election cycle. In the case of Farnese, have no doubt should Farnese become the State Senator through some indirect set of circumstances, that Doc's people will make sure a thorough criminal investigation eventually happens and at least on this I say bully for them.
3. I think the signatures thing is turning to a real problem and I welcome a solution that discourages forgery and fraudulent affidavits going into the future, but ultimately if election court says the candidate has enough good signatures to run - they should stay on the ballot independent of criminal law. What a lot of people are not realizing that while this whole business is ugly on the front end (election law), its likely to be even uglier on the back end (criminal law - i.e. see comment on Farnese above) - so yes solutions that clarify the law once and for all and discourage candidates once and for all from similar practices going into the future are not a waste of time.
-Sean
MrLuigi, my cat, actually only types half as badly as I do.
Payton Scandal Continues, AG involved?
Word on the street is that the AG is already looking into this case...this could be because of the John Danford court challenge, or who knows? There is also some issue the AG is looking into about signing blank affidavits, but I don't know what that means.
Regardless, the issues as I hear them being discussed are (for his 179th Petitions):
* Payton signed 13 petitions as circulator. On the ones he circulated are at lease 10 dead people, and people registered to vacant homes.
* Payton signed his own name four times on different petitions
* Payton turned in 5 supplemental peitions that weren't notorized
* Dorothy Lawson, President of St. Thomas Seniors, said that her name was forged on a Payton circulated petition, as was the name of her dead husband
* There aren't 300 good signitures on all the Payton petitions
But the problems don't stop there!
On the petitions for Obama Delegate:
* Payton circulated 11 petitions
* Most of the signitures are bad
* Francis Clay, President of the Frankford Civic Association, is saying his signiture was forged
And beyond the petitions, people are talking about how Payton didn't file financial reports for 2006, and his 2007's went in Monday with dubious information like $85,000 raised in increments under $50 (sounds pretty far fetched).
Has Payton made a putlic statement yet? What is he saying about the petitions he circulated?
Also, to those that know him on this group, if there is a reasonable explanation for all this, isn't now the time to be transparent, come clean, and put it out there? Why the silence? If any of this information is incorrect, someone please clarify that and correct it. My intention is to understand what's going on here, and why no outrage??
No west you are wrong - sort of
Payton signed as the circulator which as I understand it indicates taking legal responsibility for the contents of the sheet and swearing to the best of your knowledge that the contents are true and legally valid. It is not swearing you collected them yourself and it was only recently when a court decided that the circulator had to directly oversee the collection of the signatures (which is not the same thing as collecting yourself).
Also for the record each of the things you are accusing Tony Payton of were equivalent to faults on the signatures that Renee Gillinger and YPP's own Gaetano signed as circulator's on. If the AG pursues criminal charges against Payton, they would be liable to the same criminal charges.
Most likely, however, just like with Farnese, they withdraw the forgeries in election court, have enough to make the ballot and any criminal charges will not happen for at least a year - if they do.
One general comment - people need to start disconnecting this issue from how they feel about the individual candidates.
-Sean
MrLuigi, my cat, actually only types half as badly as I do.
Thanks, if you're right
Sean,
Thanks for the clarification, if you're right... I'll look into what the law is on this and get back to you. My understanding was that as circulator, you were stating that you personally collected each signiture.
That said, I disagree with one thing, which was your assumption that there would be enough signitures for Payton to stay on the ballot. Everyone that has looked through the petitions pretty much agrees that he doesn't even have 150 valid signitures, let alone the 300 he needs to be on. Therefore, it's fairly certain that Payton will be thrown off the ballot. At that point, he maybe can run a write-in campaign, but it's highly unlikely he'd be re-elected. There would also be the scandal that an incumbent couldn't get 300 valid signitures, and the questions about what had gone on, etc.
In terms of the ballot
The whole issues in terms of the ballot is whether Payton (or Farnese or Blackwell) has enough legally acceptable signatures no matter how bad the forged ones were. In Farnese's case they withdrew 22 pages of blatant forgeries and then sucesfully legally maneuvered to have the court not allow Dougherty's lawyers to use the 22 pages they withdrew as a legal basis to interogate the remaining "good" pages for handwriting similarities between the bad pages they withdrew and the "good" ones. Dougherty is appealing the matter to the PA Supreme Court and hopefully there will be some final clarity on what it means to sign as a "circualtor" for obvious forgeries, once and for all.
I obviously agree anybody who doesn't have enough "good" signatures should get booted, but even what counts as "good" depends largely on how things went in court that day and whether a handwriting experts testimony is allowed or not. I'm hoping that a positive development out of all of this mess is that some final clarity about what the rules actually are in terms of signatures and ballot challenges gets laid out by both the Attorney General and the PA Supreme Court.
Story about Dougherty's appeal to the PA Supremes.
-Sean
MrLuigi, my cat, actually only types half as badly as I do.
Won't leave this alone
OK - so you're obviously invested in this - for one reason or other. You just can't help steer every thread to Farnese.
It's kinda sickening - to be honest. The judge ruled in favor of Farnese for reasons that were discussed openly at the trial. Farnese had the required minimum of 500 signatures - therefore the Judge ruled that Farnese stays on the ballot.
Why oh why, is there continued speculation, hearsay, and all kinds of other nonsense?
Three weeks ago, you practically had all those associated with the Farnese campaign in the slammer (based on the previous paragraph).
Let's just see what happens down the road.