Ex-mayor sentenced to 2 years on election fraud conviction« Thread Started on Feb 1, 2007, 2:25am » --------------------------------------------------------------------------------Ex-mayor sentenced to 2 years on election fraud convictionBy Laurence Hammackread at source> http://www.roanoke.com/news/breaking/wb/102548WISE -- The man who personified both power and corruption in the tiny coal town of Appalachia was sentenced today to two years in jail for stealing an election.Ben Cooper, the town's former mayor and acting town manager, received the sentence from Wise County Circuit Judge Tammy McElyea.Prosecutors have said that Cooper, motivated by his desire for total control of a town of about 1,800, directed a scheme in which he and 13 others consipred to steal absentee ballots from the mail and cast them for a slate of candidates who later took control of the town council. Other votes were bought with cigarettes and beer, according to an indictment returned by a grand jury last year.The sentencing of Cooper and three other defendants today marked the apparent end of a case that has been called the state's largest election fraud in the past half century.