AUGUSTA — Allegations of ballot tampering in a House district recount Wednesday prompted state Attorney General Michael Carpenter to launch an investigation into possible criminal activity.

Republican officials involved in the recount of House District 38 said their Democratic counterparts had implicated an aide to House Speaker John L. Martin, D-Eagle Lake, who has been suspended with pay.

The aide denied doing anything wrong.

“I’m a real convenient target. I’ve been a thorn in their side for a real long time,” the aide, Kenneth Allen, said in a telephone interview from his Gardiner home.

Carpenter, who said he could complete his probe as early as Thursday, impounded a box of ballots said to contain 15 votes for Democratic candidate Deborah Shaw Rice. He said the ballots would be checked for fingerprints.

The Democratic attorney general said he was alerted Friday night by Secretary of State Bill Diamond about a possible security breach in the room where the ballots were stored. Diamond said his subordinates were concerned the room had been entered without permission.

Carpenter said officials from his office inspected the room but found no sign of forced entry and did not investigate further, although Diamond had the locks on the door changed as a precaution.

The controversy over the recount intensified Wednesday, however, with new disclosures from Rice and her attorney, Jonathan Hull, which prompted Carpenter to investigate further. The disclosures were made at a private meeting among officials on both sides in the recount.

Election Day results showed Rice narrowly losing to Republican Joseph B. Taylor in District 38, which includes parts of Cumberland, Windham and Yarmouth.

Two Republican officials involved in the recount said Hull told them that Allen, the Martin aide, had contacted him Friday and told him that 14 extra votes for Rice had been added to the ballots being recounted.

Hull and Rice “thought (Allen) was either drunk or joking,” said Rep. Sumner Lipman, R-Augusta, who has monitored many of the legislative recounts.

Hull declined to comment.

Lipman and John Bott, a former GOP legislator who is serving as Taylor’s attorney in the recount, acknowledged that Hull did not explicitly say Allen was personally responsible for the extra ballots.

But “I don’t know how else he would know,” said Lipman.

Allen said Lipman’s assertion was simply “not true.”

He said he did call Hull on Friday, but only to relay information he received from a woman who claimed to work for the secretary of state’s office. He said he had arranged to meet the woman in Augusta to learn more about 15 to 25 votes that supposedly had not been counted, but that she did not show up.

Allen said he was placed on leave Monday because he is an alcoholic and Martin wanted him to get treatment, not because of problems with the recount. Martin concurred, saying he was not aware of the allegations then.

Allen also maintained that his decision to take the time off was voluntary, but his boss disagreed.

“I ordered it,” said Martin, D-Eagle Lake.

Allen, who played a key role in the recount that forced Lipman to run in a special election two years ago, said he is the victim of a Republican vendetta.

Republican Gov. John R. McKernan alerted U.S. Attorney Richard Cohen and Justice Department officials in Washington about the case, which resulted in little more than angering the attorney general.

Carpenter said it was “unconscionable” for McKernan to have issued his statement without at least alerting Carpenter in advance. He said he resented the implication that state prosecutors could not handle the case alone.

“I strongly resent that. We were on top of this immediately,” said Carpenter, who like Diamond is elected by the Legislature.

U.S. Attorney Richard Cohen said he would confer with Carpenter to “get the facts first-hand” before deciding whether federal action is warranted.

Martin also issued a statement saying he agreed with McKernan on the need for “a full, exhaustive and independent investigation” of both the recount process and security considerations for elections in general.

“We owe the people of Maine no less than the complete truth,” he said.