Sonoma County man, 77, convicted of election fraud 'experiment': DA

A pair of mail-in ballot drop boxes are displayed as a voter returns a voting card at a Clark County voting center on Election Day during the 2024 Nevada presidential primary election in Las Vegas, Nevada, February 6, 2024. (Photo by Patrick T. Fallon / AFP) (Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images)

(KRON) — William Eschenbach, a 77-year-old Westerner, was convicted and sentenced Tuesday by a Sonoma County Superior Court judge for election fraud, the Sonoma County prosecutor said.

The district attorney's office investigated the matter after receiving a referral from the Sonoma County Registrar of Voters' office. Another local resident notified the office after noticing Eschenbach posting comments on X, formerly known as Twitter, about voting twice in two separate 2022 elections.

In January 2024, Eschenbach posted on After his experience, Eschenbach said he “never heard back” from election officials, so he thought he had “proved that mailing was not secure,” the prosecutor's office said.

Unbeknownst to Eschenbach, the Election Management System (EMS) automatically canceled his additional absentee ballot when officials noticed he had submitted more than one vote, the prosecutor's office said.

Through further investigation, officials determined that Eschenbach first mailed his first absentee ballot before Election Day and, while it was being processed, he voted in person on Election Day “with the intention of voting twice,” the prosecutor’s office said. . Eschenbach did so in both the June 2022 primary election and the November 2022 general election.

Due to electoral safeguards, Eschenbach's two attempts to vote twice resulted in only one vote. “It is important to understand that election safeguards worked as intended to prevent fraud and protect the integrity of the vote,” said Registrar of Voters Deva Marie Proto.

Eschenbach was sentenced to six months of court-supervised probation, ordered to perform 40 hours of community service and pay $500 in restitution to the Sonoma County Recorder's Office.