Jamaica Plain-based Scott Brown Field Rep Cites 'Cheating and Fraud' in Dorchester

The leader of Senator Scott Brown's office in Jamaica Plain says she and other observers have seen "cheating and fraud" at several Dorchester polls.

"There's an abundance of unregistered voters," Gina Sierra-Nova said in a phone interview with JP Patch. "I can't believe it."

Sierra-Nova said unregistered voters were filling out affidavits and showing licenses to cast provisional ballots at the fire house polling station at 7 Parish St. and Pasciucco Apartments on Bowdoin Street in Dorchester. Those polls are for Ward 15, Precincts 2, 3 and 4.

That's actually the legal process for voters whose names aren't on the rolls in Boston, not fraud. But Sierra-Nova said she expects the required follow-up on the affidavits, in which the Boston Election Department matches the names given to records, might not be carried through.

"How often is that done?" she said.

But the view from the JP for Elizabeth Warren campaign headquarters just two blocks away was starkly different.

Alison Murphy, a volunteer for the Democratic hopeful, said Republicans have been practicing "subtle intimidation" at some Boston polls, but not in JP.

Sierra-Nova said Republican election observers do not speak to voters, they merely report what they are seeing.

Republican allegations that in-person voter fraud is a major problem have been widely debunked in studies of the issue, a recent review by the New Yorker argues.