By Stephanie Taylor
Staff Writer

“From the very moment we began, we encountered deception, deceit and even intimidation.” Troy King, attorney general GREENSBORO | Two arrests in Hale County Thursday night marked the beginning of the end of an allegedly long, dishonest tradition in Hale County, Attorney General Troy King said Friday.

A Hale County grand jury indicted Rosie Lyles and Valada Paige Banks on Thursday on multiple felony charges related to voter fraud after King presented evidence collected during more than three years of investigation.

Banks is a former Greensboro City Council member.

“Very rarely do we have elections in Hale County that we do not receive complaints,” King said Friday morning during a news conference at the Hale County Courthouse.

“This has been a systemic problem of corruption. It is a culture problem, an elite believing they have the right to decide who holds office,” he said. “Democracy itself is the victim of what is occurring here.”

More arrests will follow, he told a group of more than 100 residents gathered to hear the announcement.

Both Lyles and Banks were charged with second-degree possession of a forged instrument — an affidavit for an absentee voter — with the knowledge that it was forged, and four counts of promoting illegal absentee voting.

One of those counts involves a Democratic primary on Oct. 26, 2004, and three involve a Democratic primary on May 3, 2005. Both primaries were part of special elections.

The primary in 2004 was a three-man race for the State Senate District 21 seat. It was part of a special election held to replace former Sen. Charles Steele, who became president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

Demopolis City Councilman Thomas Moore led the primary, but Sen. Bobby Singleton of Greensboro, then a member of the House, eventually won the seat in a runoff.

Moore beat Singleton by 155 votes out of more than 17,000 cast in the district, which includes portions of Bibb, Choctaw, Greene, Hale, Marengo, Perry, Sumter and Tuscaloosa counties. In Hale County, however, Singleton received 2,058 votes to Moore’s 1,037.

The 2005 primary was part of a special election held to fill the District 72 House of Representatives seat vacated by Singleton when he was elected to the Senate.

Political newcomer and Greensboro resident Ralph Howard overwhelmingly beat Perry County Commissioner Albert Turner Jr. with 57 percent of the vote.

The district includes all of Hale and Perry counties, the eastern half of Marengo County and the southern half of Bibb County.

Howard won his home county of Hale, despite hundreds of absentee ballots that were cast for Turner.

Of Howard’s 2,264 votes from Hale County, 43 were absentee votes. Turner received 1,380 votes from Hale County — including 813 absentee votes.

King would not provide further details about the investigation or the allegations against the two women.

If convicted on the possession charge, Lyles and Banks could face one to 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $5,000 each. The charge of promoting illegal absentee voting is an unclassified felony, and is punishable by one to two years in prison and fines of $500 to $2,000 for each count.

Ann Langford, a clerk in the Hale County probate judge’s office, said that the number of absentee ballots has declined in every election since 2000. “By no means did they go away or did the fraud go away,” she said. Only 300 absentee votes were cast in the most recent election in 2006, down from thousands in previous years, she said.

One factor that may have contributed to the decrease, she said, was that volunteer poll watchers working for candidates or political parties were allowed to sit in the absentee vote office and observe for the five weeks the office was open.

Also, the U.S. Department of Justice stationed agents at every polling place during the general election.

“No doubt, all of that observation played a part,” Langford said.

King said that the investigators from his office met with resistance from some people during the investigation.

“From the very moment we began, we encountered deception, deceit and even intimidation,” he said.

“It got so bad that one of my investigators was arrested and put in jail,” he said, referring to an incident when a woman filed a harassment complaint against an investigator who tried to serve her with a subpoena.

Beverly Bonds is a founding member of the Democracy Defense League, a group formed to fight voter fraud in Hale County and has grown to include almost 1,700 people from throughout the state.

“We’re trying to get thousands of members,” she said. “The Legislature won’t do the right things unless voters put pressure on them to get it cleaned up.”

Stiffer penalties for offenders would be a good start, she said.

King said that groups like the Democracy Defense League have been a great help during the investigation.

Bonds said that the group has been accused of racism. The Sumter County Record Journal quoted Singleton on Feb. 18, 2005, as saying the group was “racially motivated.”

But the members of the group and its board include white and black citizens, Republicans and Democrats, she said.

“This is not about racial issues, this is about right and wrong,” she said. “We’ve been waiting quite a long time for this.”

Both Lyles and Banks were booked into the Hale County Jail on Thursday night. They posted bail the same night.

Banks was found guilty in December of first-degree theft involving $8,758 in food stamps she received for 10 months, claiming to be broke. King, who prosecuted the case, said Banks received the welfare benefits after having already received thousands of dollars in a legal settlement.

Reach Stephanie Taylor at or 205-722-0210.

By Troy King Alabama Attorney General

(GREENSBORO)—Attorney General Troy King today announced the arrests of two defendants indicted on charges related to alleged voter fraud in Hale County. Rosie Lyles and Valada Paige Banks, also known as Valada Undra Paige, both of Greensboro, were arrested late yesterday by Attorney General’s investigators and the Hale County Sheriff’s Office, and taken to the Hale County Jail.

Attorney General King personally presented evidence to a Hale County grand jury on August 16, resulting in the defendants’ indictments, each for multiple felony counts. Rosie Lyles and Valada Paige Banks are each charged with the following:

• one count of second-degree possession of a forged instrument—an affidavit for an absentee voter—with the knowledge that it was forged; and
• four counts of promoting illegal absentee voting—one of these counts involving a Hale County Democratic primary election held on October 26, 2004, and three of these counts involving a Hale County special Democratic primary election held on May 3, 2005.

Second-degree possession of a forged instrument is a class C felony, punishable by one to 10 years imprisonment and fines of up to $5,000 for each count. The charge of promoting illegal absentee voting is an unclassified felony, punishable by one to two years imprisonment and fines of $500 to $2,000 for each count.

The following is the text of Attorney General King’s prepared remarks at today’s press conference:

“Yesterday, the people of Hale County and my office took a strong step forward in the quest for justice and truth at our ballot boxes. Yesterday, we overcame three years of obstacles and roadblocks when a Hale County Grand Jury returned 2 indictments, one against Rosie Lyles and the other against Valada Paige Banks. Each indictment contains 4 felony counts of Promoting Illegal Absentee Voting and one felony count of Second Degree Criminal Possession of a Forged Instrument.

Honest, fair elections are the foundation on which democracy stands. Violations of these laws are offenses against all of us. I have made it a priority in my administration to see that Alabamians can trust the results of our elections. Over three years ago, we began an investigation into allegations of absentee voter fraud occurring in this county. From the very moment we began, we encountered deception, deceit, and even intimidation. It got so bad that one of my investigators was arrested and put in jail. During this time, we met with a number of concerned citizens and tried to reassure them that we had not forgotten about Hale County, that we believed honest elections are as important here as they are anywhere else in our state. Today, we are one step closer to holding accountable those who would try to steal our elections.

Coming back to Hale County yesterday reminded me of another time that I visited your county. In the mid 1990′s, Governor Fob James approved a grant to the “Safe House” here in Greensboro. When I arrived on behalf of the Governor, I was greeted by one of the sweetest ladies you will ever meet and she told me a story that I have never forgotten. She told me how, in 1965, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was in west Alabama. The Ku Klux Klan determined to kill Dr. King as he left town late one night. The Klan had blocked off the highways out of town and into safety. The only other road out of town was dangerous. In fact, the Klan had earlier burned down St. Matthew’s Church on that route. Dr. King was taken that night to a home and nonchalantly slept there in safety. The men protecting the home and Dr. King positioned themselves around the house. As they waited in silence, the Klan, fully hooded, drove slowly past in a bumper-to-bumper procession of about 50 cars. The grant I brought that day helped preserve that house and the museum within it that now holds this history, and is a reminder of how far we have come.

Yes, I thought of my trip here, I thought of those long ago events that frightening night in 1965, I thought of the Safe House that protected Dr. King through the night, I thought of Dr. King. Events since Dr. King’s night here in Hale County have brought rampant allegations of vote fraud in nearly every election and have shown how quickly a dream can become a nightmare. This investigation and these indictments are efforts to move those things Dr. King prayed for, that he worked for, that he fought for, that he bled for, and that he died for from being a dream to a waking reality.

We have fought our way through every obstacle, and with dogged determination, we have moved one step closer to bringing an end to election fraud in Alabama. Our investigation does not end here, however. This is a continuing process. We will continue to work to identify those who have rigged elections, and we will seek to drag them into the light of justice.

No one outside of Hale County can clean up Hale County’s elections, no one can protect Dr. King’s dream here except those of you who live here, those of you to whom he entrusted it. Yesterday, those of you who served on this grand jury did your part. You built on the hard work already performed by Probate Judge Leland Avery, Sheriff Kenneth Ellis, former Sheriff Larry Johnson, Circuit Clerk Catrinna Perry, Moundville Chief of Police Ken Robertson, and Greensboro Chief of Police Claude Hamilton. I thank each of you for your patience and dedication. I especially thank Special Investigator George Barrows of my staff for his tireless dedication to this mission. We would not be here without his work.

All of Alabama can rest assured of this – our state’s elections will be honest and fair. We will not rest until it is so.”

No further information about the investigation or about the defendants’ alleged crimes other than that stated in the indictment may be released at this time.

An indictment is merely an accusation. The defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

The Tuscaloosa News: Editorials

Since 2005, a group of West Alabama residents has been working quietly to solve a problem that has plagued politics since politics began: election fraud.

Their pluck and grit has gotten them far, and in addition to the notice taken by state politicians and Alabama Attorney General Troy King, average citizens are jumping on board as well, a bandwagon that is welcome to this part of the country, where fraudulent ballots are far too common.

The grass-roots organization, The Democracy Defense League, appears to have picked up steam and will hold a meeting Saturday to organize its first statewide convention for April 2008.

The group, an Alabama organization fighting for honest elections and more severe penalties for voter fraud in Alabama, was once a fledgling group of voters from Hale County.

The league’s membership has grown to 1,689 members in 41 counties.

The league has been credited with helping reinstate Greensboro Mayor Vanessa Hill, declared the winner of the 2004 election over Johnnie Washington by the Alabama Supreme Court in January of this year.

The group’s motto, that “the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing,” is appropriate enough, with examples of good men doing nothing popping up around the state in regard to election fraud.

The next meeting of The Democracy Defense League will be 9 a.m. Saturday at The OutsideIn on Main Street in Greensboro. We encourage the public to attend, even if only to learn more about our state’s political system and wrongdoing associated with it.

The Tuscaloosa News

By Lucinda Coulter Staff Writer

Staff Photo | Dusty Compton Carolyn Payne, left, and Pattie Dismukes stand in front of former Alabama governor Thomas Seay’s home in Greensboro on Wednesday. Seay was the governor of Alabama from 1886-1890. Dismukes and Payne are the co-chairs of the grassroots, nonpartisan group for ethical elections, the Democracy Defense League. The league was started in 2005 with 125 concerned citizens in Greensboro and has grown to almost 1,700 people in 41 counties. GREENSBORO | Pattie Dismukes stood next to the American flag displayed on the front porch of her white-clapboard home built more than a century ago.

The ideals of what the flag represents have long inspired Dismukes, a retired high school social studies teacher. Dedication to those ideals, especially voting rights, is why Dismukes delayed plans to relax after retirement.

She agreed in March to co-chair the Democracy Defense League, a grassroots organization fighting for honest elections and more severe penalties for voter fraud in Alabama. Once a fledgling group of voters from Hale County, the League’s membership has grown to 1,689 members in 41 counties.

“The flag symbolizes what this country is all about, and I hope, what I’m all about,” Dismukes said of advocating with the nonprofit Defense League.

“I want our city and county to become a place where everybody counts as a person.”

Encouraged with increasing support, she and co-chair Carolyn Payne will meet Saturday to organize the League’s first statewide convention for April 2008.

“Our cause is to bring honest elections to this state,” said Payne, a Hale County native who retired as an/selementary school principal after 37 years teaching. “We feel strongly that the freedoms we enjoy are not free. I’d like citizens to step forth and do something noteworthy for this state.”

Taking action

The two natives of Hale County have been advocates with the Defense League since its inauspicious start in January 2005 at Citizens Bank in Greensboro.

When Dismukes moved from southwest Louisiana nearly three years ago to Greensboro, her hometown, she was appalled at ethical breaches inside voting polls in the mayoral election.

She said she was distressed when she saw people inside the polls sporting T-shirts with candidates’ names.

Earlier, The Tuscaloosa News reported that absentee votes were coming in from addresses of abandoned houses.

Dismukes was one of the 114 Hale County voters who took action to reform the voting abuse.

Since then the league has been credited with helping reinstate Greensboro Mayor Vanessa Hill, declared the winner of the 2004 election over Jonnie Washington by the Alabama Supreme Court in January of this year.

Perry, Tuscaloosa and Jefferson county residents have rallied for the league’s cause. In addition, Alabama Secretary of State Beth Chapman has publicly supported the grassroots advocacy.

The Democracy Defense League’s proposals for more stringent election laws, more guidelines for absentee voting and changing voter fraud penalties from misdemeanor to felony status have gotten the attention of several state newspapers, as well as the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. In 2005, advocates met with Attorney General Troy King, who is reported to have started an investigation of voter fraud.

Facing opposition

Members in the nonprofit organization include Republicans, Democrats, blacks and whites.

But Sen. Bobby Singleton, D-District 24, has said the group is a racist organization. He told The Sumter County-Record Journal in the Feb. 18, 2005 issue that the group “is racially motivated.”

Singleton was elected in January 2005 with more than 30 percent of the votes from absentee ballots. Some suspect that election may be the result of voter fraud because the percent of absentee votes was unusually high.

Rates higher than 3 or 4 percent are considered unusual.

But Singleton said Thursday his election was fair and contradicted what he said in 2005 about the group. He said he is not familiar with the Democracy Defense League.

“I don’t even know who they are,” Singleton said in a telephone interview.

Last September, the League distributed a survey to state legislators with the hope of finding sponsors for election law reform during the regular legislative session.

As League volunteers recruited others and spoke to civic groups, enthusiasm of the advocacy spread from word of mouth, from family to family and from club to club, Dismukes said.

“When you stop and think about it, it’s pretty amazing what we’ve done so far,” Dismukes said. “But I’ve always been a habitual voter and already had an interest in social studies.”

Having passion

Greensboro resident Perry Beasley, Defense League founder, said Dismukes and Payne have the passion needed for political reform.

“They’re both very civic minded, articulate and very patriotic,” he said. “They’re wonderful.”

Beasley retired from the Alabama Bureau of Investigations after a 25-year career in public service.

He said that Alabama’s voters are fed up with longtime inequities.

“It takes the citizens to cause quite a stir to get the attention of the attorney general,” Beasley said. “Voter fraud is looked upon as frivolous, and it’s not treated with the seriousness it’s due. The laws they have now are a joke.”

He said voter fraud and poor election laws cripple the state’s basic democratic functions. Examples of it are all over the state, not only in the Black Belt, he said, citing recent convictions in Mobile.

“Voter fraud is not somebody else’s problem,” Beasley said. “It’s all of ours. We’ve got to come up with serious and realistic legislation to improve this important issue.”

He is not surprised the Democracy Defense League is growing.

“Voter fraud in West Alabama has been handled with a wink and a nod for years and years by those in power,” Beasley said.

Hale County native Adelaide Hearns said that, as a black woman who grew up during the Jim Crow era, she is especially proud of the League.

“I have always believed in democracy,” Hearns said. “Dr. King would not have approved of stealing votes. We want a high felony charge associated with voter fraud, and we’re not stopping until someone goes to jail.”

Dismukes and Payne said they hope to transform voters’ fear and apathy to activism.

“We like our Web site’s motto,” Dismukes said, “that the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

Reach Lucinda Coulter at 205-722-0206.