But Browne claimed that the entire case against him was politically motivated, cooked up by Democrats to damage his credibility in a tough battle against incumbent Legislator Joe Scannell (D-Baldwin) in the 5th L.D. race, which may be decided by a couple of hundred votes pending a county Board of Elections recount. Browne said he understands the competitive nature of politics, but in his mind, by filing criminal charges against him with the D.A., Democrats "crossed the line."

"The letter demonstrated, in my view, that all of the charges that the Democrats and Joe Scannell levied against me were lies and they knew them to be false when they made them," Browne said of the Nov. 4 letter to the D.A. "And I think it reflects very poorly on the campaign that Mr. Scannell and the Democrats ran that they stooped to these tactics. They spent the entire campaign trying to bring down my character.

"I ran a campaign on the issues — aggressive, yes, but on Mr. Scannell's record, not on his character," Browne continued, comparing his campaign to the one run by Democrats. "They did the opposite."

Browne added that he has dropped his defamation lawsuit against Dash, which he had filed in response to Dash's lawsuit.

As of Monday, Scannell was leading Browne by 365 votes in unofficial tallies cited by the county Board of Elections. Four hundred sixteen votes have yet to be counted. For updates, visit www.liherald.com/baldwin.