Election law fraud – Brandon Hall guilty on 10 counts

GRAND HAVEN, MICH. – political activist Brandon Michael Hall has been found guilty on 10 counts of election law fraud. He had pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Hall, 27, resident of Grand Haven, is an author of the West Michigan Politics blog and self-admitted political junkie.  He said the verdict wasn’t a surprise. He had resigned himself to that possibility after the Michigan Supreme Court, during this past summer, determined his case should be tried as a felony.

Hall was charged with election law fraud after forging signatures on petitions in a 2012 effort to get judicial candidate Chris Houghtaling on the ballot.

Local courts initially agreed with Hall’s position that the case should be tried as a misdemeanour based on a statement printed on the petitions. But the Attorney General’s Office appealed the case through the court system until the Michigan Supreme Court made the decision. This caused a delay in the case to coming to trial. Hall was formally charged with the felonies again in August.

During the lengthy appeals process, both the defense and the Attorney General’s Office agreed to a list of stipulated facts. Those facts included the following: that Hall was helping Houghtaling get signatures on petitions for a May 1, 2012, filing deadline; that Hall and a friend, Zachary Savage, filled in the petitions using different colored pens and different hands; that Houghtaling drove Hall and Savage to Lansing while they continued to fill in the signatures; and that Hall copied numerous names from a 2010 petition.

Assistant Attorney General Greg Townsend emphasized those facts during the trial and questioned elections official Carol Pierce about the process her office went through in qualifying the petitions. Pierce noted the similarities in the signatures and said they were enough to cause officials to take a closer look at all of the petitions.

Savage testified that Hall came to his apartment the day before the signatures were due and asked for help filling out the forms. Savage agreed, noting that he was supposed to be paid for his help, and the two worked most of the night in what Townsend called “round tabling” to fill out the forms. They continued the next day, eventually transferring their work to the back seat of Houghtaling’s car while he drove to Lansing. He said, “At one point, Mr. Houghtaling asked Brandon Hall to reach into a suitcase … to see if those would help. These were the 2010 petition forms used to help fill out the 2012 forms.”

Savage was given immunity from election law fraud charges by the Attorney General’s Office in exchange for his testimony in this case.

Hall also testified about writing signatures on the petitions while driving to Lansing. During that interview, Hall said that Houghtaling had indicated that he didn’t care how the young men obtained the signatures as long as they got enough prior to the deadline. Hall declined to talk about his activities the night before.

Hall did not take the stand during the trial.  Hall’s sentencing is scheduled for 1 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 27. He faces up to five years in prison.