Dialing for Votes in Lake County: Was the Phone Book a Source for Terry Link's Signatures? UPDATED x4

I promised myself I wasn't going to post on the Terry Link petition scandal this week and move on to other topics, but the situation keeps getting more and more outrageous.

Here at Team America, we have been scratching our heads trying to figure out exactly where Kenneth Davison and Jerry Knight, the two primary petition circulators, got all of those names from. From the very beginning, everyone was skeptical that any two petition circulators, no matter how dedicated (or well-paid) could have garnered over 2300 legitimate signatures (60 Pages for Knight x 25 sigs = 1,500 sigs; 32 Pages for Davison x 25 sigs = 800 sigs).

Various theories have been floated: use of old petitions and/or old voting registration lists were considered, and rejected by our team as unlikely possibilities. Then someone made the connection (I'd love to give credit where due, but this researcher prefers to avoid the limelight) to listings in, of all places, the local telephone directory.

What's the phone book connection, you ask? Read on...

First, an amazing number of petitions have the names listed in ALPHABETICAL ORDER (by last name, just like it is in the phone book). As someone who has passed many a petition, I can attest that it is extremely hard to plan my route of circulating petitions door to door in such a way that the names go in alphabetical order. People also don't tend to sign in alphabetical order at Jewel, the post office, or other usual signature gathering spots. For example, petition Sheet #77, circulated by Jerry Knight, has the following last names appearing on lines 7-22:

Adams, Bell, Burton, Cook, Cooney, Garcia, Hamilton, Hill, Keller, Lopez, Moore, Nagel, Palmer, Rollins, Watt, Zacks

Notice a pattern? If that wasn't enough, try Sheet #127, also "circulated" by Jerry Knight. Last names in lines 1-19 are in alphabetical order:

Clausing, Danatte, Eckert, Edwards, Funk, Godoy, Gonzales, Hughes, Humphreys, Kawa, Keeper, Lentz, Mehan, Massimo, Phillips, Reizner, Senatin, Severones, Underwood

And, if that didn't convince you, just to mix it up, sometimes they started at the bottom of the sheet, which resulted in names appearing in reverse alphabetical order. Sneaky, sneaky. For example, on Sheet #62 (another Knight special), we have (starting at line 25 and going up the page):

Gustafson, Heuschmidt, Jarrett, Kowalski, Lloyd, Little, Morris, Naber

None of this is immediately apparent unless you take the time to look, since the signatures are all First Name followed by Last Name. You have to look at the last names to pick up the pattern. But, similar alphabetical (or reverse alphabetical) "coincidences" were noted by our persistent researcher as follows:

Sheet 6 - line 10-23
Sheet 41 - line 7 - 23
Sheet 62 - line 25 going up the page
Sheet 77 - line 7 - 22
Sheet 100 - line 1 - 22
Sheet 102 - line 3 - line 25 and continuing to Sheet 101 - line 1 - line 5
Sheet 103 - line 7 - line 25 and continuing to Sheet 104 - line 1 - line 12
Sheet 124 - line 1 - 23
Sheet 125 - line 7 - 25
Sheet 126 - line 1 - 25
Sheet 127 - line 1 - 19 and starts over line 20-25
Sheet 138 - line 11-25

That not good enough to convince you that something fishy is going on?

There's more. Sometimes they must have gotten tired and transposed the names. For example, Barbara Jarrett (sheet 62, line 23) "signed" her name as "Jarrett Barb". Often, names were off by a letter or so--i.e., Clyde Golwitzer (Sheet 8, line 14) has his name "signed" as "Goldwitzer." Most people tend not to misspell their own names when signing documents, but it's easy to misspell when it's NOT YOUR NAME that you are writing.

Sometimes, the first names in the phone book are listed by initials only. For example, also on sheet 62, "B. Myers," who is listed that way in the phone book, unsurprisingly, "signed" her (his?) name as "B. Myers" on the petition. Some of these people actually contacted by our faithful researcher indicate they never sign with only their first name initial. "A. Moran" listed on sheet 40, line 18, with the correct address, says she NEVER signs as "A. Moran" (her first name is Amy) and Ms. Moran says she has beautiful handwriting to boot (her husband agrees... but the signature on the petition is barely legible).

And, in some cases, where a person's first name was only listed by the first initial in the phone book, the circulator appears to have simply guessed at the first name. Sometimes, they guessed wrong. For example, an "Addie" Underwood supposedly signed Knight's petition (Sheet 127, line 19). The phone book listing is for "A. D. Underwood." But, the Underwood who lives at that the address (as we found out on the reverse lookup white pages on the Internet) is "Ausie D. Underwood,'" not "Addie." (it's a clear signature on the petition, so there is no doubt about the mistaken first name).

The phone book method may also account for the names of certain "dead people" that seem to have "risen" on the Link petitions. For example, Larry Jelinek, someone I knew who passed away earlier this year (but still "signed" Link's petition), is still listed in the phone book.

Finally, to close the book on the "phone book" theory, sometimes the "circulator" screwed up the address by using the address for the person listed above or below the individual who supposedly "signed" the petition. For example, Aritha Walker (sheet 41, line 23) is listed as living at 245 Jackson, in North Chicago. Aritha lives on Jackson, but at a different street number. "245" is April Walker's house number at a completely different street in Mundelein. April Walker is the entry in the phone book immediately above Aritha Walker. Again, it's hard to mistakenly write your own address, but pretty darn easy when you are copying out of the phone book and are off by a line or two. Oops.

Does anyone really need any more to prove that there is a massive case of petition fraud going on here?

Moreover, I think this pretty much blows away Terry Link's position that someone is playing tricks with his petitions. Unless a large group of people armed with Lake County phone books somehow signed numerous pages of Link's petitions without the circulator catching on that the signatures were being forged right out of the phone book, I'd say the evidence of fraud is in the petitions itself. Care to try again, Senator?

Please explain this, Senator Link. Your constituents are getting tired of waiting. I can only hope that the State Board of Elections and other authorities are interested in hearing your explanation as well...

MEANWHILE, IN THE TENTH DISTRICT....

Dan Seals and Jay Footlik faced off, after a fashion, before the Tribune editorial board. See the article here. Footlik confronted Seals on his 'you come out on the side of peace' statement when Seals was asked about a theoretical conflict between Iran and Israel from the last election. Glad to see Jay's finally picking up a few pointers from our humble blog. Also, Seals appears to believe that only "millionaires" live in the Tenth District, since he can't afford to move in (no surprise, since he's out of work). Unincorporated Middle already has some thoughts on that gaff. The article also noted that Seals, ironically, also criticized Footlik for only renting a house in the Tenth District. Funny how Seals claimed the residency issue was an unimportant red herring last time around, but now it's a good dart to throw at Footlik.

Next, Mark Kirk and Melissa Bean made quite a press splash by calling on Springfield legislators to get off their collective duffs, at the risk of losing over a BILLION dollars of federal matching funds for mass transit if state legislative action isn't taken. Seals hates it when Bean goes out and works with Mark Kirk. As we've noted here, Seals seems to think that partisan loyalty should trump bi-partisan cooperation when it comes down to serving the people of the Tenth District. Well, Bean was never much of a Dem anyway.

UPDATED 12/12/07: Things may be looking up for Jay Footlik, as the Trib reported tonight that Footlik beat out Dan Seals for the endorsement of the Illinois Federation of Teachers. Read Seals' response here, and he doesn't sound too happy. Unincorporated Middle has more here. Don't get too excited Jay; after all, this union is the same one that's a big fan of newbie state senator Michael Bond, so there's no accounting for taste. The union reportedly gave Bond more than $40,000 in campaign contributions, so you would think that the endorsement also comes with a cash prize.

UPDATED x2 12/13/07: Momentum on the blogosphere may be picking up on the Link scandal. Follow blogger El Rider over at Flying Debris takes a look at PhonebookGate and comes up with a better lede than I did. After all, why pass petitions door-to-door when you can "Let your Fingers do the Walking." Damn. I should've thought of that.

UPDATED x3 12/13/07 12:30 p.m.: Rich Miller over at Capitol Fax Blog seems to be taking a greater interest in the Link petition scandal now that we've been beating the drum here for a few weeks. Rich has posted the affidavit from Jerry Knight's former landlord that was presented at last Saturday's petition hearing in which the landlord attested that Jerry Knight did not live at the address in Waukegan (838 Hickory) that he gave on his petitions which he circulated. Rich also posted the testimony that Knight gave at the hearing in which Knight swore that he did live at the Hickory address through November 9th, and finally also posted a copy of a police report in which Knight was arrested for trespassing in Zion on November 7th, but gave a Chicago address. The documents are posted in the subscriber-only section on Capitol Fax Blog, but TA has them as well, and we will post them if there is any interest.

UPDATED x4 12/13/07 10:00 p.m.: By popular request, here are copies of the documents that were posted over at Capitol Fax Blog under the subscribers-only section. Rich Miller and I got them from the same source, I'd bet, so I assume he's not claiming copyright ;-)

Here is Jerry's Knight's testimony attesting that he lived at the Hickory address in Waukegan through November 9th (and which is good for a chuckle since he claimed the 5th Amendment when asked what his current address is. What's not so funny is that the judge let that pass). Here is the copy of the police report from his arrest on November 7th, giving a Chicago address. And here is the affidavit from his former landlord stating that Knight did not live at the Hickory address since 2006.