Error Theory

Sound Politics posted the names of 26 people registered to vote at the same private mail box service that Sound Politics uses. I decided to pitch in with the effort to track down vote fraud by Googling and Yahooing these names to see what came up. Where I could find home addresses, I plugged them into the Sound Politics voter database to see if I could find any indication that any of these people had also voted at their residence address. One of the names, Scott B Nichols, turns out to match that of a voter who voted at a residence address. There may well be two Scott B’s, but its worth checking out. I went as far as I could with it (scroll down to number 19) and still can’t tell if these Scott B’s are different people or not. To resolve these cases, we need the birthdate information that Stefan Sharkansky at Sound Politics is trying to get Washington State to release.

A second case also merits a closer look (number 6). Unless there are two Tamsen Tremain Byfield’s, it looks an Aussie may have voted in Seattle. [UPDATE: An emailer writes that Tamsen is a U.S. citizen. See comments. Updated update: Her brother emails that she is a legit WA voter.]

For most of the names there is not enough information readily available to tell anything. My findings, with links, are posted below. There is no legal issue of privacy with the information posted here, since it is all publicly available, but what about the moral issue? In itself, registering to vote from a private mailbox address when one has a residence is suspicious and it may violate voter-registration regulations. At the same time, the possibility of voter fraud has to be investigated and there is no way to spare the innocent from scrutiny in such an endeavor. Since the immediately available information is often not sufficient to determine whether the people who show up in Google and Yahoo searches are the same people who are registered to vote at 4509 Interlake, the only way to investigate the possibility of vote fraud is to collate the available information and let other interested parties see if they can take it further.

Voters who registered at 4509 Interlake mailboxes:

1. Nurkala, Vance Karl: There is a Seattle area drummer by this name.

http://www.vancenurkala.com

Yahoo people search gives his address as:

11719 36th Ave Ne
Seattle, WA

Plugging this address into the Sound Politics voter database, there is a Theresa Nurkala who voted from Vance’s address, but not Vance. You are cleared of double voting Vance. One down, twentyfive to go.


2. Akre, Eric J: There is a Seattle area drummer by this name.

http://archives.thedaily.washington.edu/1996/022296/citutil.html

(To find the reference, search the link for his name.)

Nothing on Yahoo. Intelius.com (referred by Yahoo) claims to have some info on Eric J. from 2001. It costs $8 to look at it, so I’ll pass, but Intelius does allow 24 hrs of unlimited searching for $20. If someone were going to spend a day investigating these private mailbox voters, it might be worth it, if the Intelius information amounts to anything.


3. Bean, April J: No Google results. Intelius verifies an April J.


4. Berg, B Richard: There is a Richard Berg from Redmond who I found commenting about audio equipment at:

http://www.headphone.com/layout.php?topicID=138&subTopicID=164

What’s with music people and private mailboxes?

Yahoo has an address for a Richard Berg at:

1508 Ne Brockman Pl
Seattle, WA

When I look this up in the database of voters, no Berg voted in this block, so if it is the same Berg, he only voted at the Interlake address.


5. Berg, Jean S: Intelius claims a Jean S in WA. No hits for “Richard and Jean Berg” (or vice versa).


6. Byfield, Tamsen Tremain: CHECK THIS ONE OUT! [UPDATE: An emailer writes that Tamsen is a U.S. citizen. See comments.]

A zoologist by this name pops up with .au (Australian) and .za (?) email addresses. The latter is from a 2004 conference in South Africa. Did this Byfield do a turn at a Seattle area university and decide to make himself a permanent U.S. voter, or is this a different Tamsen Tremain Byfield?

http://www.hmapcoml.org/Default.asp?ID=190

On the other hand, Intelius claims to have some 2001, 2002 and 2003 info on a Tamsen Byfield from WA, so maybe there ARE two Tamsen Tremain Byfield’s. Why not? It’s a cool name. If I get a dog, I might name it Tamsen.


7. Davis, Daron George: No results.


8. Pat Day: Intelius claims a couple of Pat Day’s.


9. Dugger, Benedict: There is a Seattle area Soccer coach by this name.

http://sharksfc.tripod.com/id60.html

http://www.woodlandsoccer.org/minutes/01jul.htm

Yahoo has an address for this name at:

9014 Burke Ave N
Seattle, WA

The voter database finds no Duggers voting at this address. Cleared.


10. Hagar, Loren Frank: Runs a construction company that uses 4509 Interlake as its mailing address.

http://www.qdci.com/

No other address available.

11. Hersrud, Adrianne Avis: A Java programmer from Seattle?

http://www.intellij.net/forums/thread.jsp?forum=13&thread=52713&message=618723

Also a moderately competitive high school girl’s cross country runner. Good going Adrianne.

http://www.jcrawford.net/girlsaa94.html

No Yahoo address. Intelius claims some info.


12. Austin, Holiday: Intelius claims some info.


13. Kavanagh, Veronica Marie: A gal by this name was honored as a Phi Beta Kappa inductee in 2004, apparently from North Seattle Community College. Good going Veronica.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=%22Kavanagh%2C+Veronica+Marie%22&btnG=Search

The link goes to NSCC, but no info on Veronica currently posted.

Intelius claims to have some info.

14. Krause, Timothy M: No Yahoo address. Intelius claims some info. A cached Google page has a Seattle address for a Timothy Krause.

http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:mJxwiGc2XzIJ:www.efw.bpa.gov/Environment/EW/PROPOSALS/AIWP/2000/docs/names.txt+seattle+%22timothy+krause%22&hl=en

TIMOTHY KRAUSE
3415 NE 70th STREET NO 6
SEATTLE WA 98115-5950

I can’t get any results for this block from the voter database. Maybe I am inputting the address wrong.


15. Latschaw, Robert: Intelius claims some info.


16. MacKenzie, John Roy: There is a real estate agent in Seattle named John MacKenzie.

http://agent.kw.com/136304/

His address is: 4452 California Ave, Seattle WA 98116.

I can’t get anything to come up on the database for this address either.

Yahoo has a John MacKenzie at: 5942 41st Ave Sw, Seattle WA. The voter database has no MacKenzie voting in that block.


17. Morrison, Robert M: On the surface this one looks interesting.

There is a Robert Morrison who is a politically active Seattle lawyer. In 2001 he made a modest contribution to the campaign of Edsonya Charles, who was named last year to a judgeship by Seattle Mayor Nickels.

He is also a member of a consumer advocacy network called the Washington Assistive Technology Alliance (WATA):

WATA gives the following info for their Robert Morrison:

Robert Morrison (greater Seattle and Western WA)
1201 Third Avenue, Suite 3150
Seattle, Washington 98101
206-587-3737; 206-587-0277 FAX

Areas of expertise: Discrimination issues; trusts and estates; guardianships; general disability issues; probate and real estate.

Yes, I admit it. Activists in Democrat/left causes like Naderite “consumer advocacy” are just the kind of people I suspect of being prone to shenanigans like distributed vote fraud. Gee, why would anyone suspect Democrats? Just because prominent Democrats keep saying they want “every vote to count,” with no qualifier as to whether the votes are legitimate or not?

I have no grounds to suspect Morrison in particular except that he is registered to vote at a private mailbox, which in itself is suspicious. What specific evidence is available for Mr. Morrison is exculpatory. Yahoo people search has a Robert Morrison at:

11817 1st Ave S
Seattle, WA

No Morrison voted on that block, so if this is the same Robert Morrison who is registered at 4509 Interlake, he is not a cheater, at least under his own name (and one would think that if someone were to use a phony name, he would do it at the private mailbox rather than at home).


18. Nichols, Amy M: Intelius claims some info for Amy M.


19. Nichols, Scott B: Yahoo has a Scott Nichols at

1515 Madrona Dr
Seattle, WA

Uh Oh (maybe). The voter data base says that a Scott B Nichols in this block voted at the polls. Unless there are two Scott B Nicholses, it would seem that Mr. Nichols double voted (a felony). One way to investigate further is to spend the $8 at Intelius and see if Amy Nichols (the previous name on the list) also lives at 1515 Madrona Dr. If so, it would pretty much nail down that the two Scott B’s are the same person.

None of the Intelius addresses for Amy M. Nichols match Scott B’s address except for the 4509 Interlake one. Interestingly, however, Amy M has had a LOT of addresses. There are multiple Amy M’s, but on Iltelius the Interlake address comes with a birthdate. That same birthdate attaches to four other addresses in 2001-2. Maybe that explains why she got a mailbox.

None of Amy's other addresses show voting by Amy M. I am tempted to also buy the several addresses for Scott B to see if any of them match any of Amy M’s addresses, but since I already know that no Nicholses voted from any of those addresses, what is the point? One moral of the story here is, if you are going to start using Intelius, spend the $20 and get the 24 hrs unlimited.

There is also the possibility that the birthdate info available on Intelius would clear Scot B Nichols by showing that the Interlake Scott and the Madrone Scott are different people. I guess I have a responsibility to check that out, since I have raised the suspicions. Here goes.

Dang. Inconclusive. Intelius does not have the Interlake mailbox address for Scott B Nichols, so I can’t compare the age of that Scott B with the one at Madrone.

Still, the combination of the multiple addresses and the birthdate info indicates that Intelius can be a valuable resource, and might not be superfluous even if Stephan is able to get comprehensive birthdate info for free. It’s just not going to do the job in all cases (like the present one).


20. Repon, Susan K: No results.

21. Siebensohn, Alex: Intelius claims some info.

22. Smith, Corinne A: Intelius claims some info.

23. Waxberg, Steven Richard: Intelius claims some info.

24. White, Peter: Intelius claims some info.

Google finds a Peter White who is another Seattle musician.

Google also finds a Peter White who is a Seattle area sales manager. His address is 815 NE 45th. I can’t get any database results for this address. It may be another work address in a non-residential area.


25. Willen, Brent G: Intelius claims some info. Google finds a Brent Willen who is a member of a Seattle religious skeptics group.

Can’t find any address for Brent.


26. Williams, Jan: No results.


UPDATE: Stefan Sharkansky emailed with a couple of other resources people can use to help track down vote fraud in King County:

a property tax database (to look up by address),

and the Recorder's website (to look up by name).

If I can find the Rossi contact info for sending vote-fraud leads, I'll update with that too.