Polling place broken into in Cumberland County

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Thursday, November 3, 2016
East Regional Branch Library
East Regional Branch Library
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FAYETTEVILLE, NC (WTVD) -- The Cumberland County Sheriff's Office is looking for the man who broke into a Fayetteville early-voting place Wednesday.

Officials said the burglar broke a window and smashed a door to get into the East Regional Branch Library on Clinton Road and take a coin machine.

Nothing related to the election at the one-stop voting place was damaged, said officials.

"There was no evidence that anything in the one-stop area had been tampered with," Cumberland County Board of Elections Director Terri Robertson said. "There were two electronic voting machines that fell down, but this appeared to be when the person tripped over the cords."

Robertson said that after a polling place closes for the night, computers that have voters' data are secured in a locked cage, along with all election supplies. That laptop was not taken and seals placed on the voting machines the night before were still intact and were then cut on each electronic voting machine and the counts recorded by the machines the night before matched those on the laptop.

Surveillance video from the building also showed the burglar did not appear to be interested in the voting materials.

"We assure our voters that there was no breach in the voting system. This video evidence shows this person was after a coin machine only," Robertson said.

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