East Longmeadow voter fraud affidavits nowhere to be found

Date: 8/22/2012

By Chris Maza

chrism@thereminder.com

GREATER SPRINGFIELD — Nearly a week after multiple search warrants were executed relating to the alleged voter registration fraud case in East Longmeadow, local Hampden County courts continued to refuse to acknowledge that warrants were issued.

While District Attorney Mark Mastroianni said on Aug. 17 that multiple search warrants were executed on Aug. 16 and new evidence was found, three separate clerks' offices — Springfield Superior and District Courts and Palmer District Court — told Reminder Publications that they had no record of any affidavits or returns on any search warrants.

Reminder Publications was on hand at the East Longmeadow Town Clerk's office, a location at which one of the warrants was served on Aug. 16.

Returns on any search warrant must be made within five business days of the execution of the warrant.

When this newspaper requested copies of the affidavits and any returns on the search warrants, a representative at the Springfield District Court Clerk John Gray's office referred the inquiry to Palmer District Court. A representative from Palmer District Court Clerk Brian St. Onge's office said there were no records there of any warrant applications.

After two separate inquiries were made with Superior Court Clerk of Courts Brian Lees' office turned up no results, Reminder Publications spoke with Lees directly, who explained that it would be unlikely that his office would receive any search warrant applications or returns on those warrants.

"That wouldn't come to my office until there was some kind of indictment by the grand jury, " he said. "We don't have it yet."

Ronda Wainwright, speaking on behalf of Mastroianni said that the contents of the search warrants have been impounded. She had no further information.

However, Lees said that even if the information was impounded, meaning sealed by a judge, there should be some record of their execution.

"But even if they were impounded, there should be something that at least says that there were [search warrants]," Lees said.

St. Onge was not available for comment, as he was in court, according to a staff member who answered the phone in his office.