Former county elections official arrested

In a bizarre footnote to two botched elections, former King County elections superintendent Julie Anne Kempf has been arrested in an investigation of forgery, theft, criminal impersonation and assault.

Kempf, who has not been charged, was booked into the county jail Tuesday and promptly released.

Kempf, 40, was fired almost three years ago over the late mailing of absentee ballots in the November 2002 election. The investigation by the King County Sheriff's Office, begun several months ago, does not involve Kempf's conduct while on the job but is related to her subsequent dealings with the elections office.

Sources familiar with the case said investigators have been looking into whether Kempf created fraudulent documents that got two other election workers into trouble last year.

The employees were briefly suspended but then exonerated, said a former elections worker who asked not to be named.

Said one of Kempf's attorneys, Amanda Lee, "I have every reason to believe she's innocent."

A number of county elections employees, including Director Dean Logan, have been questioned about Kempf's contacts with people in the elections office since she was fired.

Logan yesterday referred questions to the Sheriff's Office.

Sheriff's spokesman Sgt. John Urquhart said he would only discuss the alleged assault, because that is the only part of the investigation that has been completed. Urquhart said the alleged assault occurred July 11 when a fraud detective tried to talk to Kempf while she was in her car.

After Detective Chris Johnson showed his badge and identified himself, Urquhart said, "She accelerated at a high rate of speed. It was necessary for him to jump out of the way to avoid being struck. When you do that, it's assault."

He said the detective was standing about three feet in front of Kempf's car when it accelerated.

Lee, Kempf's attorney said, "At this time neither we nor Julie Anne are going to make any comment about the matter until we've had a chance to investigate the allegations. We're confident that we're going to have a full and fair opportunity to be heard by the assistant attorney general who's in charge of the investigation before they make any charging decisions."

Brian Moran, chief criminal prosecutor for the state Attorney General's Office, which is working with the Sheriff's Office, would not discuss specifics of the investigation.

Kempf was fired in early 2003 after an internal report said she lied about the late mailing of thousands of absentee ballots in the 2002 election and instructed staff to hide information about the delay from her boss.

After telling voters that all ballots had been mailed before they actually were mailed, Kempf offered explanations that were later discredited.

She appealed her firing, saying she hadn't lied but had inadvertently passed along bad information she'd received from subordinates. She later withdrew her appeal, saying she couldn't get a fair hearing.

Kempf's successor, Bill Huennekens, was demoted last month after more than half a year of embarrassing revelations about mistakes in the 2004 election.

Kempf often irritated Logan during the recent election controversy, claiming she kept better track of ballots than the county has done under him. In one interview, Logan answered a reporter's question by saying, "Why don't you ask Julie Anne Kempf?"

Keith Ervin: 206-464-2105 or kervin@seattletimes.com