Republican legislative candidate in South Dakota faces 24 years in prison for petition signature mistakes

The hardened criminal you see in the photo above lulls you into a false sense of security via her status as a wife, mother of three and professional physician. Don't be fooled. She's a danger to society. In fact, she's a felon times twelve. No joke. If the South Dakota justice system metes out the full force of the law, innocent South Dakotans will soon be able to sleep peacefully once again - knowing that Dr. Annette Bosworth is behind bars and can no longer threaten them with nomiating petition mistakes.

Oh, did I mention that she's a conservative Republican and a Christian? You know those monsters. They go on about morality and "family values" while exposing their hypocrisy by messing up campaign paperwork. You have to have a lot of nerve going overseas to provide free medical care to poor people when election bureaucrats expect you to be witnessing petition signatures. And yes, this is really happening. Because of such esoteric mistakes, Bosworth has really been convicted of 12 felonies and is really looking at the possibility - although not the likelihood - of 24 years in prison:

Bosworth said during the trial that she never intended to mislead anyone when she attested to signatures on campaign documents that she didn't actually witness. She was out of the country on a medical mission trip at the time. Bosworth also has admitted that she didn't personally gather some signatures, despite attesting on documents that she had witnessed people signing petitions. Under state law, the person circulating petitions must witness the signings from registered voters. Although Bosworth argued that the prosecution was politically motivated, her defense largely relied on her argument that she received bad advice from her attorney and political consultant during the 2014 campaign, Joel Arends. Bosworth's trial lawyer portrayed her as a neophyte candidate who knew much more about medicine than about the political process.

Arends denied the allegation, testifying that Bosworth "absolutely and definitely" knew the proper way to fill out a nominating petition. He called it "a lie" that he had advised her she didn't need to witness signatures. "This verdict is very significant in that the jury sends the message that our electoral process is very sacred and the integrity of the process has to be protected," Deputy Attorney General Robert Mayer told reporters after the verdict. Testifying in her own defense earlier in the trial, Bosworth said her actions were "careless." "I was doing everything possible to get it right," Bosworth testified last week. "I felt like I did a very good job trying. Clearly, I'm sitting here because we screwed up." Bosworth's attorneys said she thought she could properly call herself the petitions' "circulator" because they were circulated under her direction. Her medical license could be jeopardized. She faces a maximum punishment of 24 years in prison and $48,000 in fines. Now look, Bosworth clearly messed this up. She admits that. But it's just as clear that she didn't intend to do anything wrong, and she certainly didn't do anything serious enough for anyone to treat it as a felony. This is a classic case of election officials and prosecutors taking their own inside games just a little too seriously. It's important that the nominating process be conducted with integrity, and if Bosworth attested to her witnessing of signatures that she didn't really witness - that's a serious mistake whether or not it amounted to an intentional deception. It's probably deserving of a nominal fined - something that probably should be handled administratively. But come on. A criminal trial? Felony charges? Prison time? For what? For a candidate who finished fifth in the primary and is prepared to quietly go back to private life with her family and her private practice as a doctor? If Annette Bosworth spends one minute in jail, the South Dakota justice system has lost its collective mind.

Dan Calabrese——Bio and Archives

Dan Calabrese’s column is distributed by HermanCain.com, which can be found at HermanCain

Follow all of Dan’s work, including his series of Christian spiritual warfare novels, by liking his page on Facebook.