Man charged with offering beer for vote
By Karl-Thomas Musselman
Off the Beaten Path News is reporting what is a sad personification of politics and education today. I call it the Buy a kid beer for a vote against raising his property taxes for the kid's education plan.
A man tried to buy a vote with a 12-pack of beer, according to police in northern Kentucky. Edward Lucas offered the beer to an 18-year-old student at Ludlow High School in exchange for a no vote on a proposed increase in school property taxes, Ludlow police officer James Tucker said in an affidavit.
Lucas was charged Friday with making or receiving expenditures for vote, a class D felony that can land him in prison for one to five years. Lucas, 40, denied the charge.
"I don't know the boy, and that's not exactly what was said," Lucas said.
"I said, 'I hope it doesn't go through and if it doesn't, I'm going to have a big beer party.'"
Lucas was arrested Friday and released on bond Saturday. Police dispute his version of the exchange, but declined to give specifics. The tax increase was on the ballot Tuesday and lost. It would have generated about $75,000 a year for school construction projects.
Posted by Karl-Thomas Musselman at March 31, 2004 07:42 PM
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