Man Pleads Guilty to Casting Missing Wife’s Mail-in Ballot for Trump

Andy Jacobsohn, Getty

A man once charged with murdering his missing wife pleaded guilty to casting a bogus vote for Donald Trump in her name.

Barry Morphew, 54, pleaded guilty to one count of forgery in district court in Chaffee County, Colorado. By pleading guilty, he avoided jail time. Instead, he was sentenced to one year of supervised probation.

His wife, Suzanne Morphew 49, went missing on May 10, 2020, after a bike ride. Prosecutors charged Barry Morphew with first-degree murder, but dropped the charges in April.

When a ballot in Suzanne Morphew’s name arrived at the Chaffee County clerk’s office about five months after her high-profile disappearance, officials contacted police. Dated Oct. 15, the ballot featured Barry Morphew’s name on a line meant for a legal witness to sign the ballot. It did not feature a voter’s signature.

Morphew told FBI agents he cast the fraudulent ballot “because I wanted Trump to win.”

Trump lost Colorado to Joe Biden by more than 13 percentage points and more than 400,000 votes. The ex-president has baselessly claimed the election was stolen from him via widespread voter fraud.

“I just thought, give him another vote,” Morphew said, claiming his wife would have voted to reelect the former president. “I figured all these other guys are cheating. I know she was going to vote for Trump anyway.”

A lawyer for Morphew stated his client thought he could assume legal guardianship over his wife’s affairs, and that this included voting in her stead.

“He believed that because he could sign legal documents for her, that the ballot, similarly, was under his authority,” his lawyer said. “So he was following her wishes. He did not sign her name. He signed his name on the witness line. So he didn’t, in any way, intend to deceive the clerk of the court.”