Case alleging voter fraud heads to trial

A 49-year-old woman accused of using an absentee ballot to vote in the name of her dead partner in the Nov. 3, 2020, election and charged in Ozaukee County Circuit Court with a rare case of voter fraud will head to trial next week, lawyers said Tuesday.

Christine A. Daikawa signed the ballot, which was deposited in a City of Cedarburg ballot drop-off box on election day, as the witness and later told authorities she also signed her dead partner’s name as the voter, according to the criminal complaint.

Daikawa, who had a Thiensville address but was found living at her deceased partner’s house in Cedarburg, said she also voted in person via absentee ballot in Thiensville on Oct. 28, which means that if the allegations of voter fraud are true, she may have tried to vote twice in the same election.

But the absentee ballot cast in Cedarburg, which was requested on March 28 and mailed on Sept. 16, didn’t count. It was rejected after being caught by poll workers on the day of the election when they entered it into the My Vote state database, which allows voters to track their ballots, and discovered the voter was dead, City of Cedarburg Clerk Tracie Sette said in November 2020.

Sette said that after investigating the ballot she turned the matter over to police.

  A Cedarburg police officer found an obituary for the alleged voter and learned that Daikawa, in addition to signing the ballot as the witness, had been the partner of the person named on the ballot.

When confronted by the officer, Daikawa admitted that both signatures on the ballot envelope were hers and said, “I did it, but I didn’t mean to,” according to the complaint.

According to the officer, Daikawa later said “that she committed voter fraud and that she’s now going to jail,” the complaint states.

Daikawa is charged with one misdemeanor count of making a false statement to obtain an absentee ballot and election fraud-impersonating an elector, a felony punishable by a maximum 1-1/2 years in prison and two years of extended supervision.

“I’ve been a clerk for 4-1/2 years and I’ve never seen anything like this before,” Sette said, adding that the case demonstrates that safeguards meant to prevent voter fraud work.

“With all the talk about voter fraud lately, it’s good to see the system works,” she said.

On Tuesday, Daikawa’s lawyer, Michael Hart, and Assistant District Attorney Antonella Aleman-Zientek said they are prepared for the jury trial scheduled to begin Tuesday, Oct. 12, before Ozaukee County Circuit Judge Steve Cain.