After weeks of contested results, the Republican Party primary for State’s Attorney is over.

Paul Komada won the nomination in a 35-19 victory decided last week when his opponent, Duane Deters, dropped out of the race.

During the morning of the election, voters were accidentally given the incorrect ballot. In the Mattoon precinct 3-1, the first 60 voters were only given the federal election ballot.

Coles County Clerk Sue Rennels said the ballot problem happened in counties across the state.

“This was a very misfortunate incident and I have been assured by the Illinois State Board of Elections that this issue was wide spread across the state,” she said. “As ISBE explained to me, unfortunately, this is not an uncommon mishap.”

Deters decided not to challenge the results stating that the process would be too costly and would cost the state thousand of dollars to rectify the mistake.

“Considering all the factors present, I have decided that it is not fair to the taxpayers of this county to pay for this mistake, and I will not contest the election,” he said.

Although Deters has dropped out of the race, he is encouraging voters to support Paul Komada throughout the rest of the elections and says that he believes that Komada has the necessary experience to effectively run the office and successfully prosecute criminals.

“Well I think that’s very kind of Duane, and that demonstrated he’s a very responsible person,” Komada said. “I’m sure that would tend to indicate that he’s probably got a future in politics and we’ll see him running again.”

Komada had served in office once before 21 years ago and believes that his previous time spent in office has helped him in winning the primary. Komada left the position to serve as Coles County Judge, leaving the job earlier than he wanted to.

“I had the opportunity to run for judge, and, as they say in politics, timing is everything, and I took advantage of the timing and ran for and was elected judge, and that’s why I left the job,” he said.

Komada decided to run for State’s Attorney because he doesn’t like the way the job has been handled since his time away from the office.

“I did a lot of talking to people prior to the primary election, and a very large amount of people said that they were not happy with the way the State’s Attorney’s Office had been run, and they felt there was a need for a change,” Komada said.

Michael Schwader can be reached at 581-7942 or