Posted on October 10, 2008

Voodoo Linked to Cobb County Election

WSB-TV (Atlanta), October 7, 2008

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A woman who practices voodoo in South Carolina claims commissioner Annette Kesting wanted her to put a curse on the opponent who defeated Kesting in August.

The voodoo priestess, George Ann Mills of Blythewood, S.C., filed a report with Cobb County police claiming Kesting’s checks for the ceremony bounced.

Kesting was soundly defeated in mid-August, and according to the voodoo priestess she wanted challenger Woody Thompson to either develop cancer or be involved in a car wreck.

The woman claims Kesting gave her pictures of Thompson and wrote her $3,000 worth of checks, but those checks bounced.

The voodoo rituals were apparently never performed.

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The Blythewood, S.C., “priestess” said she was approached in late August by Cobb County Commissioner Annette Kesting. Kesting was seeking otherworldly help, Mills said, against Democrat Woody Thompson, who defeated Kesting in the primary runoff vote for the District 4 seat representing southwest Cobb.

Mills has accused Kesting, a first-term commissioner, of writing $3,000 in bounced checks for her services.

Kesting on Tuesday denied ever meeting Mills.

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Mills, 55, has had some experience with bad checks. Public records show Mills has a record going back to 1997 for passing fraudulent checks.

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Mills said when Kesting visited her, she held up a photo of a man she said was Thompson.

“She said, ‘Do you see cancer in him?’ I said he looks like a very healthy man,” Mills said. “She said, ‘Is there anything you can do about this . . . give him cancer, or make him have an accident or something?’ ”

Mills said she refused, saying she didn’t want Thompson’s blood on her hands. She offered to “make trouble for him, to make people see who he really is.”

Instead of performing a ritual for Thompson, Mills said she sacrificed a chicken and three roosters to provide protection for Kesting and her son, who Kesting said was adrift. In return for her services, she says Kesting wrote two checks totaling $3,000, which were returned for insufficient funds. Kesting then sent two $1,000 money orders in payment. Mills produced a copy of a MoneyGram receipt, dated Aug. 28. The receipt, faxed to the AJC, listed Kesting’s husband, Christian, as the sender.

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Kesting’s term as commissioner has been marked by unflattering financial disclosures and personal blunders. She was delinquent in paying taxes to the county in 2007 for properties she owned in Powder Springs, and also was written up for code violations on several of her properties.

Then, in February, Kesting appeared before a Marietta church and gave an inflammatory speech in which she criticized some workers at the county government headquarters. At a news conference several days later, Kesting blamed dirty politics and the news media for the uproar. She called it part of a conspiracy to drive her out of office.