Freeport candidates’ dead voter registration lawsuit dismissed
Freeport Village Hall is shown in this undated photo. Credit: Sally Morrow
A State Supreme Court judge has dismissed a voter registration list lawsuit that had been filed by Freeport municipal election candidates.
The candidates alleged that residents who have died or no longer live in the village remained on the Nassau County Board of Elections’ voter rolls. The candidates sought a court order compelling the agency to purge the list.
The village’s election is Tuesday. The petitioners are Stephen Drummond, who is running for mayor, trustee candidates Angel Vargas and Philip Prestamo, and village justice candidate Dawn Warren.
Judge James McCormack on Monday denied the candidates’ petition and dismissed the case, according to court documents.
He wrote that the court wants to see ineligible voters struck from the rolls or placed on a challenge list, but the candidates’ list of allegedly ineligible voters may not have been accurate.
McCormack also chastised the candidates in his decision.
“Perhaps had petitioners gone to the BOE [Board of Elections] first, instead of running into court, both parties could have used the time spent in litigation ensuring that the voter rolls were accurate,” he wrote.
Bonnie Garone, an attorney for the Board of Election’s Democratic Commissioner David J. Gugerty, said the agency continues to “take all appropriate steps to ensure that the voter rolls are correct.” John Ryan, an attorney for Republican Commissioner Louis G. Savinetti, deferred to Garone for media statements on Thursday.
“The court found that, as we believed, there was no legal basis for the petitioners’ demand that more than 200 people be purged from the voter rolls,” Garone said.
Attorney JoAnn Squillace, who represents the candidates, said: “We are disappointed that the court decided not to compel the BOE but are encouraged by the court’s decision” to ask the agency to act on the candidates’ information.
