115.637. Class four election offenses.
Class four election offenses.
115.637. The following offenses, and any others specifically sodescribed by law, shall be class four election offenses and are deemedmisdemeanors not connected with the exercise of the right of suffrage.Conviction for any of these offenses shall be punished by imprisonment ofnot more than one year or by a fine of not more than two thousand fivehundred dollars or by both such imprisonment and fine:
(1) Stealing or willfully concealing, defacing, mutilating, ordestroying any sample ballots that may be furnished by an organization orindividual at or near any voting place on election day, except that thissubdivision shall not be construed so as to interfere with the right of anindividual voter to erase or cause to be erased on a sample ballot the nameof any candidate and substituting the name of the person for whom heintends to vote; or to dispose of the received sample ballot;
(2) Printing, circulating, or causing to be printed or circulated,any false and fraudulent sample ballots which appear on their face to bedesigned as a fraud upon voters;
(3) Purposefully giving a printed or written sample ballot to anyqualified voter which is intended to mislead the voter;
(4) On the part of any candidate for election to any office of honor,trust, or profit, offering or promising to discharge the duties of suchoffice for a less sum than the salary, fees, or emoluments as fixed by lawor promising to pay back or donate to any public or private interest anyportion of such salary, fees, or emolument as an inducement to voters;
(5) On the part of any canvasser appointed to canvass anyregistration list, willfully failing to appear, refusing to continue, orabandoning such canvass or willfully neglecting to perform his duties inmaking such canvass or willfully neglecting any duties lawfully assigned tohim;
(6) On the part of any employer, making, enforcing, or attempting toenforce any order, rule, or regulation or adopting any other device ormethod to prevent an employee from engaging in political activities,accepting candidacy for nomination to, election to, or the holding of,political office, holding a position as a member of a political committee,soliciting or receiving funds for political purpose, acting as chairman orparticipating in a political convention, assuming the conduct of anypolitical campaign, signing, or subscribing his name to any initiative,referendum, or recall petition, or any other petition circulated pursuantto law;
(7) On the part of any person authorized or employed to printofficial ballots, or any person employed in printing ballots, giving,delivering, or knowingly permitting to be taken any ballot to or by anyperson other than the official under whose direction the ballots are beingprinted, any ballot in any form other than that prescribed by law, or withunauthorized names, with names misspelled, or with the names of candidatesarranged in any way other than that authorized by law;
(8) On the part of any election authority or official charged by lawwith the duty of distributing the printed ballots, or any person acting onhis behalf, knowingly distributing or causing to be distributed any ballotin any manner other than that prescribed by law;
(9) Any person having in his possession any official ballot, exceptin the performance of his duty as an election authority or official, or inthe act of exercising his individual voting privilege;
(10) Willfully mutilating, defacing, or altering any ballot before itis delivered to a voter;
(11) On the part of any election judge, willfully absenting himselffrom the polls on election day without good cause or willfully detainingany election material or equipment and not causing it to be produced at thevoting place at the opening of the polls or within fifteen minutesthereafter;
(12) On the part of any election authority or official, willfullyneglecting, refusing, or omitting to perform any duty required of him bylaw with respect to holding and conducting an election, receiving andcounting out the ballots, or making proper returns;
(13) On the part of any election judge, or party watcher orchallenger, furnishing any information tending in any way to show the stateof the count to any other person prior to the closing of the polls;
(14) On the part of any voter, except as otherwise provided by law,allowing his ballot to be seen by any person with the intent of letting itbe known how he is about to vote or has voted, or knowingly making a falsestatement as to his inability to mark his ballot;
(15) On the part of any election judge, disclosing to any person thename of any candidate for whom a voter has voted;
(16) Interfering, or attempting to interfere, with any voter inside apolling place;
(17) On the part of any person at any registration site, pollingplace, counting location or verification location, causing any breach ofthe peace or engaging in disorderly conduct, violence, or threats ofviolence whereby such registration, election, count or verification isimpeded or interfered with;
(18) Exit polling, surveying, sampling, electioneering, distributingelection literature, posting signs or placing vehicles bearing signs withrespect to any candidate or question to be voted on at an election onelection day inside the building in which a polling place is located orwithin twenty-five feet of the building's outer door closest to the pollingplace, or, on the part of any person, refusing to remove or permit removalfrom property owned or controlled by him, any such election sign orliterature located within such distance on such day after request forremoval by any person;
(19) Stealing or willfully defacing, mutilating, or destroying anycampaign yard sign on private property, except that this subdivision shallnot be construed to interfere with the right of any private property ownerto take any action with regard to campaign yard signs on the owner'sproperty and this subdivision shall not be construed to interfere with theright of any candidate, or the candidate's designee, to remove thecandidate's campaign yard sign from the owner's private property after theelection day.
(L. 1977 H.B. 101 § 15.020, A.L. 1982 S.B. 526, A.L. 1985 H.B. 620, A.L. 2003 H.B. 511)