Lynn police investigate signature scandal

LYNN – Lynn police say they are actively investigating a criminal complaint filed by mayoral candidate Judith Flanagan Kennedy that alleges her signature was wrongfully affixed to campaign literature disseminated by incumbent Mayor Edward J. Clancy Jr.Kennedy on Wednesday said she has not talked to Lynn police since filing the complaint earlier this month, but Police Lt. William Sharpe confirmed the matter “is being actively investigated” by the department’s Criminal Investigations Division. A copy of the complaint was unavailable from the Police Department.Kennedy has alleged that Clancy or his campaign workers crossed the line “into criminal territory” by distributing a flier purporting to show she signed a North Shore Labor Council survey on which she checked raising property taxes as her choice for increasing municipal revenue.The Item obtained a copy of the survey and found it requires no signature from the person answering the questions, no request for a signature, nor does the document provide any line on which to sign. Nonetheless, Clancy and his staff created campaign literature that shows the survey, the box checked in favor of raising taxes and Kennedy’s signature and title as a city councilor and mayoral candidate directly beneath it.What Kennedy actually signed was a North Shore Labor Council petition in favor of workers’ rights to organize.Clancy on Wednesday said the pages from the petition and survey were presented to three candidates – him, Kennedy and former mayoral candidate David Rohnstock – as a single package. By signing the labor council petition, it was assumed the signature would pertain to the remaining pages as well, he said.It was with that thinking that the Clancy campaign put Kennedy’s signature on the survey sheet and mailed it as campaign literature.”The reason our brochure was designed that way was to remove any scintilla of doubt or any thoughts that I was putting words in her mouth,” Clancy said. “Now they’re splitting hairs. But the fact is, these pages were from the same endorsement package sent to each of us. If we weren’t expected to sign it, the answers would be anonymous. The labor council was looking for our individual views. She signed it, twice admitted it was her signature and she checked the box in favor of raising taxes. She’s trying to divert attention from that.”Clancy said police have not contacted him about the criminal complaint.”I don’t know what the police are doing about my complaint. I don’t tell them how to do their job. It could take weeks, even months,” Kennedy said Wednesday. “I’ve never been in this position before. I’ve never filed a criminal complaint, but this time I did because I felt this was a wrong doing and that I was a victim of that wrong doing. I didn’t run to the police the minute I received this mailing.”Kennedy refuted claims that her actions were unnecessary or excessive.”I believe that was a legitimate action to what I perceive was a very serious wrong doing to me,” she said. “Would you want somebody to take your signature off one document and put it on another without your knowledge? That’s what happened to me.”Kennedy, an attorney, cited chapter 56, section 42 of Massachusetts General Law, which states, “No person shall make or publish, or cause to be made or published, any false statement in relation to any candidate for nomination or election to public office, which is designed or tends to aid or to injure or defeat such a candidate.”Kennedy said Clancy has been using such a document as a campaign tool to defeat her candidacy. By doing so, the mayor’s action “goes beyond civil tort liability and crosses into criminal territory, as evidenced by the potential imprisonment punishment for any violations,” she said.The state law, relating to election falsification, further asserts that “no person shall publish or cause to be published in any letter, circular, advertisement, poster, or in any other writing any false statement in relation to any question