DeGuglielmo to Ask District Court For Absentee-Ballot Investigation

Pursuing charges made last week about possible tampering with absentee ballots, City Councillor Joseph A. DeGuglielmo '29 will appear this morning in the Third District Court of Eastern Middlesex County to ask for an "election inquest."

DeGuglielmo said his petition will name the notary he says is implicated in a shut-in woman's statement made Thursday about ballot tampering. The Councillor then will ask the Court to have the outer envelopes of all absentee ballots opened. (This does not reveal the actual ballots, but only a notarized envelope which in turn contains the ballot.)

Further, DeGuglielmo will request that the Court order all ballots notarized by the person named in his petition taken back to the individual voters. Then, should the voters want to inspect their own ballots, they can do so in the presence of an assistant election commissioner and a police officer.

DeGuglielmo hopes that if any alternation is found, the voter will correct his ballot, and then the Election Commission will rule the original spoiled. Any subsequent action, or possible prosecution if such is warranted, is entirely up to the judge, DeGuglielmo said.

Besides being contained in DeGuglielmo's petition, the name of the notarizer in question was on the inner envelope opened in the original case last week, a political observer pointed out. Hence, the Election Commission knows the name involved. It claimed Friday it could not legally open even the outer envelopes until election night without a court order.

DeGuglielmo emphasized that all the checking must be done today, the last day before the election. "All I want is an honest election," the Councillor stated.