Attorney upset after sealed document leaked in voter fraud investigation

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — A Marion County judge wants to know how a sealed search warrant affidavit for an alleged voter fraud investigation was leaked.

Defense attorneys for a voter registration group, Patriot Majority USA, requested and were granted an emergency hearing Monday evening with a prosecutor and a Marion County judge after details of the document were published by another news outlet. I-Team 8 was present in the clerk’s office Monday evening but were kept out of the meeting held in the judge’s chambers.

At issue is a search warrant affidavit that the judge told I-Team 8 remains under seal.

Linda Pence, attorney for the voter registration group founded by a Democratic strategist, said that the Patriot Majority USA’s local outlet  – the Indiana Voter Registration Project – was a “respectable organization” that helped register 45,000 voters in Indiana.

Pence said that the group has been the target of Republicans and denied allegations she says were levied against the organization.

“There are no quotas, certainly if people aren’t doing there work you expect them to have some applications… This is a respectable organization,” Pence said in an interview with I-Team 8.  “It is not voter fraud. It is not voter registration fraud. It is just making things up. I am angered by the fact that this information is being leaked the afternoon before the election.”

Indiana State Police raided the office of the Indiana Voter Registration Project in early October. Authorities claim there were concerns about forged signatures and duplicative voter applications in more than 50 Indiana counties.

The investigation began after state police received from the Hendricks County clerk Debbie Hoskins, who said she noticed problems with “8 to 10” voter registration applications where voters were already registered or whose signatures didn’t match up with the voters’ on file.

“We just thought state police should investigate that,” Hoskins said. “They didn’t match up.”

A spokesman for Indiana State Police said the investigation is ongoing.

The judge told I-Team 8 that he wants to have an additional hearing this week to determine how to proceed forward.