There’s some late-developing drama in Colorado’s Secretary of State race with Tina Peters and the man at the center of her alleged identity theft scheme.

Mesa County Clerk Peters accused Gerald Wood, an IT consultant, of committing perjury in an interview with KNUS’s Jimmy Sengenberger last week.

“I think about the gentleman (Wood), he perjured himself on the stand, we know that, and he’s going to have to deal with that,” she told Sengenberger in an interview about her candidacy for the GOP nomination for secretary of state. “Think about how fearful he must have been because look at what they’ve done to me. They’ve thrown me in jail, they’ve handcuffed me, they accused me of things I didn’t commit.”

Testimony from Wood was central to the grand jury indictment accusing Peters of felony identity theft and a variety of other serious offenses.

The allegations of identity theft stem from the fact Wood’s badge was used to access secure election offices in Mesa County on two dates last year to capture “before and after” images of an election systems update.

In sworn testimony before the grand jury, Wood said the individual that used his badge on those dates was not him.

Wood also provided several sworn alibis to the grand jury, including a graduation party on one of the dates.

Mesa County employees testified Peters herself introduced them to a completely different man that Peters called “Gerald Wood.”

The Mesa County Clerk has denied all wrongdoing.

Wood responded forcefully to Peters’s perjury accusations, telling Sengenberger in his own interview that he never lied under oath or ever used his Mesa County election badge.

“My guess is that (Peters) believes if she can discredit me, she can be absolved. The truth is that her charges go well beyond identity theft in issues having nothing to do with me,” Wood said.

Peters has not explained what she thinks Wood said on the stand that constitutes perjury. Grand Jury testimony is usually kept top secret.

“I must conclude that Peters is dragging many innocent bystanders down with her,” Sengenberger wrote.

“This includes the Wood family, her clerk employees, her faithful supporters and Republican primary voters.”

The fact Peters lobbed this accusation out there just before the June 28 primary for Secretary of State makes us suspect of what is probably going on here.

Adding to our suspicions, Republican Senate candidate Ron Hanks, a Peters ally, refused to publicly support the Mesa County Clerk in the final U.S. Senate debate.

Sherronna Bishop, another longtime activist and confidante of Peters, also recently left Colorado for Texas.

Bishop is still reportedly managing Peters’s Secretary of State bid.

To be fair all of this could be completely coincidental and have nothing to do with any unpublicized developments regarding Peters.

However, it’s impossible not to suspect that there could be more going on here than meets the eye.

Republican primary voters for Secretary of State will have to take these facts and evaluate them as they see fit.

Just FYI, Wood was first accused of criminal conduct by Secretary of States Jena Griswold, before it became apparent that he never used his badge to access the secure Mesa County election systems.