At least a dozen election ballots were stolen, filled out, and mailed to the Mesa County Clerk and Recorder for counting. Nine of the 12 were caught in the signature verification process, but three have been counted and cannot be reversed, although the voters will be given another ballot.

The ballot problem was discovered on Tuesday. Secretary of State Jena Griswold’s office was notified Wednesday morning.

“This is the first time we’ve seen something like this,” said Matt Crane, executive director of the Colorado County Clerks Association.

According to Griswold, who spoke to reporters Thursday afternoon, Mesa County District Attorney Dan Rubenstein has launched a criminal investigation. She said the U.S. Postal Service is also investigating since the ballots went through the mail.

The ballots were sent to individuals who live near each other, Griswold said. The Mesa County Clerk, Bobbie Gross, then looked at other ballots that had been rejected due to signature issues and it appeared that some of those ballots had been signed by the same person.

The signature verification process requires election judges to check the voter registration signatures on file against the signature on the ballot. When those signatures don’t match, the ballot is not counted, and the voter is contacted and allowed to “cure” the signature.

In Mesa County, the voters were notified about their ballot signature problems, and they said they had never received the ballots and had not voted.

Griswold said every single ballot return envelope is being reexamined in Mesa County. “This attempt at fraud was found and investigated quickly because of the groundbreaking tools we have here,” she added.

Four ballots made it through the initial round of signature verification. Still, one was flagged because the voter received a notification from the state’s BallotTrax system, which informs voters when their ballot is received and eventually counted. That voter contacted Mesa County to report that the ballot had never been received.

Crane said the signature verification process is designed to identify signatures that may not match. “If there’s any question at all, the ballots are rejected, and we notify the voters. So, in that way, the way the system is designed, it is designed to catch things like this, which it did. Now, obviously, it is regrettable that three got through, which is why we have clerks across the state going back and revisiting all of their processes, all of their procedures, and having a zero-tolerance policy for any mistakes that are made through the course of signature verification.”

Crane added that county clerks are being advised to review their training with election judges.

Griswold could not comment on the person or persons involved, pointing to the criminal investigation.

Griswold added that she is unaware of any other suspected fraud in the state and couldn’t comment on whether what happened in Mesa County is part of a bigger scheme.