Criminal charges against a former state representative stemming from his failed bid for a state Senate seat were dismissed this month, but prosecutors have appealed the ruling and are hoping an appellate court reinstates the 10 election fraud felonies.
Maricopa County Superior Court Judge John Ditsworth dismissed the indictment because the state statute it was based on is “unconstitutionally vague.”
Charges were initially filed against Russ Jones, a former Republican lawmaker from Yuma, in April. He was charged with nine counts of presenting a false instrument for filing, a class 6 felony, and one count of willfully concealing his activities, a class 5 felony.
Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas has appealed the court’s decision to reject the charges and vowed in a written statement “to protect the sanctity of the ballot box.”
“When our election laws are violated,” he said, “the democratic process has been injured. We will not be deterred from bringing cases against appropriate individuals regardless of political party or affiliation.”
Jones ‘disappointed’
After the announcement that Thomas would fight the court’s ruling, Jones said in a written statement he was “disappointed” the case would continue.
“I believe the trial court’s ruling dismissing my case was correct and that the Court of Appeals will concur,” he said.
The indictments against Jones are the first to arise from Operation MACE (Maricopa County Anti-Corruption Enforcement), a joint project of the Maricopa County Sheriff’s and County Attorney’s offices.
A complaint was filed with Maricopa County officials in August 2006, but the investigation into Jones did not begin until January.
If convicted of all counts, Jones faces more than 10 years in prison.
The criminal charges stemming from Jones’ 2006 Senate campaign represent the latest chapter in a controversy that began in June of that year and eventually reached the Arizona Supreme Court.
Legislative candidates must gather signatures to be on the ballot. After Jones submitted signatures to the Secretary of State’s Office last June, their validity was challenged. The state Democratic Party, which brought the petition challenge against Jones, argued his actions met the standards for forgery under the state’s criminal code and said he should be removed from the ballot.
A Maricopa County Superior Court judge agreed, and Jones appealed the decision to the Supreme Court.
The high court rejected the petition forgery argument on the grounds that the criminal definition of forgery is much more expansive than the forgery outlined in the state’s election statutes and the Legislature never intended petition forgery to be defined by the criminal statutes.
“…[W]e believe that ‘petition forgery’ would ordinarily be understood to refer to falsely signing another’s name to a petition or to otherwise fabricating signed petitions,” Justice W. Scott Bales wrote in the court’s opinion.
Jones signed the back of several petitions as the circulator, claiming he gathered all of the signatures himself, even though other people gathered the signatures. Although Jones improperly signed as the circulator and misled the Maricopa County Superior Court in his testimony during the initial hearing in the suit, the Supreme Court said he was not guilty of petition forgery and was not prohibited from running for the state Senate.
Jones ultimately lost his bid for the District 24 Senate seat to Democrat Amanda Aguirre.
Aguirre, who calls Jones an “honorable man” despite the Democratic Party’s attempt to have him removed from the ballot last year, says she doesn’t understand why her former seatmate is facing criminal charges in the first place.
“I never believed that his actions amounted to criminal actions,” she said. “Unfortunately, this is the situation. I hope justice will be served in the end.”
The indictments could also have a chilling effect on future elections, a Scottsdale Republican says. Rep. Michele Reagan, R-8, says it’s disconcerting to know that a mistake on the campaign trail — even one that is ruled by the courts to be so minor, it doesn’t require the candidate to be kicked off the ballot — can lead to criminal charges long after the election is over.
“It’s really scary to be a candidate if you can get pulled into court time and time again after the election’s over,” she said. “It makes you wonder why good people would continue running.”
Aguirre agrees and says that, while elected officials need to be careful to follow the law, they shouldn’t have to face prosecution.
“I think this is just taking this issue to the extreme,” she said.