WOODVILLE — Federal and state voting officials descended on Woodville this week after allegations of voter fraud and civil rights violations were made.

Investigators included representatives from the civil rights division of the U.S. Justice Department, the FBI and investigators from the Mississippi Attorney General’s office.

Central to the controversy is the Wilkinson County Democratic Executive Committee.

When Committee Chair Don Walsh died in April, Vice Chair Easter Prater assumed the committee’s head position.

The committee, of with 12 of the members are black and 19 white, has appeared divided along racial lines recently.

Some members of the committee allege Prater has not abided by Democratic Party by-laws, which requires committee members be notified 10 days in advance of a meeting.

A 25 percent quorum of the committee can call a meeting, but the rest must be notified.

On July 23, Wilkinson County party members called a meeting and elected Centreville resident Ann Greer to be the new chair.

The meeting was attended by 19 of the 31 committee members.

At that same meeting, a list of poll workers and clerks was appointed.

Mississippi law makes it mandatory for party members to attend meetings where poll workers and clerks are named.

Prater sent a letter setting a poll worker workshop for July 11, and reportedly said the July 11 meeting was supposed to be a committee meeting.

The letter did not reportedly state explicitly the workshop was also a committee meeting, and the meeting did not reportedly have a quorum.

When called by Greer about meeting to name poll workers, Prater reportedly refused.

When Prater was given the list of workers appointed at the July 23 meeting, she reportedly removed and replaced names with individuals of her choice.

Prater later reportedly refused to recognize poll workers who did not attend training sessions she gave, though they attended sessions taught by Greer.

Greer reportedly sent a letter to the Wilkinson County Board of Supervisors stating she was the elected committee chair.

At the Monday meeting of the board, President Robert Morgan reportedly stated the board recognized Prater as the committee chair and only poll workers appointed by Prater would be paid.

When time to prepare for elections Greer and several others were reportedly told by Wilkinson County Sheriff’s Deputies to leave the area where they were preparing election boxes or face arrest.

Greer and the others remained and continued making preparations until Prater and five deputies came to the area and removed the boxes.

Prater then reportedly told Greer and the others they would not be allowed to prepare the boxes and that she had people selected to do the work.

Supporters of Greer allege they were also not allowed to work the polls during Tuesday’s election.

Neither Greer nor Prater was available for comment Thursday.