Voter Fraud Cited Against Downey Council Candidate Salvador Franco

Los Cerritos Community Newspaper is publishing several documents that questions the legal residence of Downey City Council candidate Salvador Franco a former member of the Bell Gardens City Council.

By Brian Hews

A Downey city council candidate could be in legal hot water regarding his past voting record, and where he calls his legal residence.

Los Cerritos Community News has obtained documents that show Downey Council candidate Salvador Franco violated California voter laws after Franco voted in Bell Gardens between 2007 and 2010 while property records indicate him as a resident of Downey during that same period.

Click here to see documents.

Franco is in a heated campaign for an open Downey City Council seat that voters will be deciding in less than two weeks. His three opponents are Attorney Alex Saab, Businessman Gabriel Orozco, and Attorney Ricardo Perez.

LCCN publishes documents that shows Franco living in Bell Gardens, but voted in Downey.

According to a recent candidate mailer obtained by LCCN, Franco boasts to voters that he has lived in Downey for six years from 2007 to 2012.

But voting documents show that Franco registered to vote under his Downey address in August of 2010, three years after he moved into Downey.

Further, records confirm that Franco voted as a Downey resident in the city of Downey only in the past two years, from 2010 to 2012. For the four previous years, he voted in the nearby city of Bell Gardens while residing at the Downey address.

Franco is a former City Councilman in Bell Gardens.

“This is troubling for Downey that someone (Franco) is running for elected office has been voting elsewhere while he obviously claimed residency in Downey,” said Saab.

“I am confident that the Downey voters will see through this veil of deceit from Mr. Franco. From the many things that have been reported on Mr. Franco, from his $12,500 in campaign violations to his purchase of a city-subsidized home in Bell Gardens and bypassing 300 needy families to benefit him, this appears to be just the tip of the iceberg for him,” Saab told LCCN in a written statement on Thursday.

“I don’t think we even want to know what lies beneath the surface. Again, I am confident that Downey voters will know what’s best for Downey and will make an informed decision accordingly this Nov 6,” Saab concluded.

Also lashing out against Franco was opponent Orozco: “Its voter fraud, plain and simple, and he may have committed a felony in my book.”

“I first started having reservations about Mr. Franco when we noticed that a majority of his donors were from outside Downey, from the city of Huntington Park, and most of these donors are direct political allies of Assessor John Noguez,” Orozco told LCCN.

Noguez was still in a county jail cell as of Thursday night facing dozens of felony counts of money laundering, fraud and other charges in the largest political corruption case in the history of LA County.

“I think Mr. Franco needs to withdraw from this campaign, based upon the information Los Cerritos Community Newspaper has been able to prove about his residency,” Orozco said.

Several calls into Franco by LCCN have not been returned as of 2 p.m. on Thursday.

Look for additional updates at www.loscerritosnews.net.

Copyright. Los Cerritos Community Newspaper. Hews Media Group. 2012. All Rights Reserved. Republishing allowed with proper attribution given to Los Cerritos Community Newspaper.