According to court documents obtained by Fox News Digital, the temporary election worker in Maricopa County, Arizona, was arrested just months ago for allegedly stealing $1,800 in cash from the register while working as a cashier at a nearby grocery store. Last week, surveillance video showed the worker allegedly stealing a “digital magnetic key” from a tabulation center.
This makes me worry about how thoroughly poll workers will be screened before the 2024 election.
When asked by a reporter at a news conference on Tuesday, Maricopa County Supervisor Bill Gates admitted that the suspect, 27-year-old Walter Ringfield, was in a felony diversion program. This was information that did not show up in Ringfield’s criminal background check before he was hired as a temporary election worker.
At this point, we’re not going to get into the specifics of the case. However, we do a criminal background check on all of our temporary workers, and he was one of them during the elections. We didn’t find this when we did that criminal history check. “He was taking a break,” Gates said. “To run an election in Maricopa County, you need between 2,000 and 3,000 temporary workers.” That is why safety is very important.”
Fox News Digital got a copy of Ringfield’s probable cause statement, which says he was arrested for theft on September 30, 2023, at the Phoenix Fry Food & Drug shop on North 18th Avenue. Said the statement. The night before, Ringfield worked at cashier register 9. The next day, more than $1,800 was missing from Ringfield’s shift, according to the paper.
“There was an investigation with loss prevention and management to review security footage which captured Walter taking customers’ cash at the register and [pocketing] it over several transactions amounting to over 1800 dollars,” it says. “Later admitted to the theft and had all the cash that was stolen from yesterday in his front pant pocket,” said the police report about Ringfield.
“When asked by the officer whose money this was he stated it was Fry’s cash, and he was returning it,” it says. “Walter said he has worked for Frys for two weeks during Miranda Rights.” It was hard for him to pay his rent and bills. Walter told the police that he had taken the money from the register. After that, Walter was taken to jail on the charge that was stated. Frys wanted to be charged.”
When asked if the defendant served in the U.S. military, the paper says “yes,” and “U.S. Navy” is written next to “branch served in.”
The document also shows that the person has been arrested before for fighting and disorderly behavior. It says that Ringfield is not on active service, is not homeless, and does not need an interpreter from the court.
Under “place of birth,” it says “U.S.” and says that the person is currently a citizen of the U.S.
Fox News Digital asked the Navy’s personnel office for more information about Ringfield’s time in the military but did not hear back right away.
The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office started the case ten months ago.
As a result of the theft of a security fob from the Maricopa County Elections building in Phoenix on Friday, Ringfield was caught again.
At the press conference on Tuesday, Maricopa County Sheriff Russ Skinner was asked if there was any reason to think the theft was “politically motivated.” He said he couldn’t guess right now because investigators “are still going through a lot of digital evidence that was taken at the scene and going through things that were taken in the search warrant.”
“Right now we don’t have any signs, but we’re not ruling it out either.” We will not stop until we find the truth. We are going to make sure that we look at all the available information and follow up on anything that might lead us somewhere else or uncover other people who may be involved in this. But we don’t have any evidence of that right now.”
Maricopa County has had problems with its voting machines on more than one occasion. In recent years, especially during the 2020 presidential election, there have been many claims of election theft there.
The incident will not “have any impact whatsoever on the primary,” which is scheduled for July 30, according to Gates.
This is what the likely cause document says: “The security fobs are used with special secure tablets during the election.” “All the security fobs and secure tablets will need to be reprogrammed to be safe for the election because the security fob was taken out of the secure area.” The head of the facility says that the reprogramming will likely cost more than $19,000 and that the facility can’t be used safely until the reprogramming is done.
Gates stated that all the tabulators had been reset, the county had done a test of logic and accuracy, and the political parties had been told.
The document says that on Thursday, Ringfield was seen on security cameras walking past a desk and several tabulators. The paper says that Ringfield stops at the desk, takes out a “red scrunchy wrist lanyard with a security fob and keys attached,” and then keeps going. He is said to then put the key fob and string in the right pocket of his shorts and “immediately after, he raises his arms to stretch.”
The paper says that Ringfield’s boss told him about the theft, and “Walter told them he did not take the fob and lanyard.”
The paper says Ringfield told his boss, “If he did take it by accident, it may be in his car because it wasn’t in his pocket when he got home.” Ringfield let his boss and security look inside his car. What they saw was “a red plastic lanyard on the center console shifter and a plastic tag identifying the station one which matched the missing keys,” but the fob wasn’t there yet.
The next day, police went to Ringfield’s Phoenix home and arrested him while he was outside.
