Court Opinion

ID: 9483806
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:31:55.457337+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:49:50.656467
License: Public Domain

KENNEDY, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I agree with Judge Celebrezze that 42 U.S.C. § 1973i(e) is unconstitutionally void for vagueness as applied to the charge that Betty Salisbury voted more than once. However, in Count II she was also charged with causing others to vote more than once. I believe the evidence was sufficient to find that she caused Betty Lou Phillips to vote more than once. According to Phillips, Salisbury punched out the voting card on the absentee ballots of Betty Lou Phillips and her two sons. Phillips signed in the appropriate place for all three ballots, signing her own and her sons’ names. She then gave the ballots to Salisbury who returned them to be counted. Two were counted. There is nothing vague in the application of the statute to this conduct. A person who observes another voting multiple ballots and then delivers those ballots to be counted has caused the other person to vote more than once.
Accordingly, I join in reversing the conviction in this case but would remand for retrial on Count II of the indictment insofar as it charges that Salisbury caused Betty Lou Phillips to vote more than once.