The Press: Routine Scoop

Like many an oldtime newsman, Leroy Simms, Birmingham correspondent of the Associated Press, has for years performed the tedious election night chore of tabulating vote returns. Last month, in Alabama’s Democratic primary for attorney general. Reporter Simms sniffed a good story in his routine chore. And last week his careful tabulations paid off in a story as big as the election itself. After checking A.P.’s tabulations against the official count, a Birmingham grand jury indicted two men for vote fraud.

Correspondent Simms, 48, first became suspicious when he noticed that returns were coming in irregularly. The winner was crusading Lawyer Albert L. Patterson, who was shot and killed two weeks later (“TIME. June 28). A.P.’s figures on his vote checked exactly with the official count. But for Patterson’s opponent, Lee (“Red”) Porter, A.P. counted 1,405 fewer votes than the officials.

While he was trying to find out why, Reporter Simms got an anonymous telephone tip: “They [stole] 600 votes for Porter on one of the county totals.” Simms found that in Jefferson County Porter’s total had indeed been changed from the announced 23,060 to 23,660. On the official tally sheets, he found that “ones had been changed to sevens, zeros to sixes and sevens to nines.” Simms promptly wrote a story charging vote fraud, and put it on the wire.

After hearing testimony from Simms and his day editor, Stanley Atkins, who had also seen the altered vote sheets, the grand jury indicted two pro-Porter politicos: Russell County Solicitor Arch Ferrell (who said he was innocent), and Chairman Lamar Reid of Jefferson County’s Democratic Executive Committee (who would make no statement).