Did the Edwards Machine buy votes in Tangipahoa Parish??

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For the third time in the last seven months, federal agents have come calling, this time armed with subpoenas for many of the town’s elected officials, including the mayor, police chief and most, if not all, of the Amite Town Council members.

Sources told LouisianaVoice the list included Mayor Buddy Bel, Mayor Pro Tem Jonathan Foster, council members Neil Carrier and Rose Sumrall, and Police Chief Jerry Trabona, Independence Town Council member Calvin Baptiste, former Roseland Mayor Louis Ruffino and Amite businessman Tom Ed Brumfield.

Two independent sources told LouisianaVoice the FBI is investigating allegation of vote buying in the 2015 statewide election in which John Bel Edwards was elected governor and his brother, Daniel, was re-elected sheriff.

Unconfirmed reports said a judge and an attorney are also under investigation for their alleged participation in the vote-buying.

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One of those served with a subpoena, Baptiste, is an employee of the sheriff’s office and a member of the Independence Town Council. He was earlier embroiled in allegations of VOTE BUYING lodged by local businessman Larry Holland.

It was unclear what role those issued subpoenas might have played or what information they may have that brought them to the attention of investigators but the folks in Amite must feel by now that they’re on a first-name basis with federal agents and are exchanging vacation stories.

Last December, about 100 federal agents simultaneously RAIDED the Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff’s Office and the Hammond Police Office in a far-reaching U.S. Justice Department investigation of a joint federal drug task force that also included sheriff’s deputies. Computers, cellphones and case files were seized in those raids.

Three months later, they were back, this time to investigate a fraudulent bail-bond SCHEME involving several sheriff’s department employees.

Fraudulent bail-bond operations are certainly not new to Louisiana and federal authorities successfully PROSECUTED one such scam in New Orleans earlier this year.

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