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Departments Election Issues Part II – Squire v. Geer: Facts the Magistrate left out are even more shocking than the ones he included by Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman July 30, 2007 Note: This is the Second in a Two-Part Series The Free Press recently published an article entitled "Sausage making and electronic voting machines" that revealed shocking facts about e-voting flaws in a 2006 Franklin County, Ohio judicial race. This extensive investigation into this stolen election is a strong indictment of electronic voting in general. It underscores the importance of the national debate on the Holt Bill and other legislation now pending on "reforming" or abolishing the use of these problematic machines altogether. Indeed, what was left out of the Magistrate's report in the Squire case (which is now on appeal) but was well documented in the court’s evidence record, constitutes an even greater indictment of touchscreen voting machines than has generally been known. To understand the implications of this obscure election, readers should realize that it’s one of the most exhaustively studied e-voting races in U.S. history. Election Day and recount observers, two auditors, joined by one of the country’s leading electronic voting experts and under oath depositions and testimony from Board of Elections officials exposed in detail the unreliability of electronic voting systems. The Franklin County Board of Elections (BOE) appears to have violated the law when it refused to comply with Ohio law. BOE officials must follow election laws. "Strict compliance" is mandated under Ohio law. Failure to comply is a first-degree misdemeanor. The BOE refused to impound election material as ordered by the Franklin County Court of Appeals. Magistrate Joel Sacco refused to punish the BOE and allowed them to get away with presumed fraudulent activity in their non-compliance with the Appeals Court order. Ohio law assumes fraud has taken place when election officials refuse to comply with court orders. Moreover, Franklin County BOE Executive Director Matt Damschroder admitted under oath that he did not compare the total votes cast in the recount precincts with the number of voters listed in the pollbook in direct violation of the Secretary of State’s recount requirements. Also, when election officials failed to provide the poll books, poll lists and/or signature poll books for visual inspection as requested, they again violated recount procedures. The facts the Magistrate ignored in the court record are the most damning toward touchscreen voting machines. Much of this reaches the legal standard for criminal election or vote tampering. The key issue regards how election officials handled the real time audit log (RTAL) paper rolls that are supposed to ensure a fair recount. Hundreds of RTALs were already sitting out on various tables when Judge Squire’s observers entered the recount site. Dr. Rebecca Mercuri, Squire’s expert witness, noted that the correct procedure is for the "sealed containers holding the RTAL rolls to be opened in the presence of observers." The premature extraction of the RTALs exposed the audit to the potential of a biased result. Missing from many of these paper rolls was the additional tamper-proof tape that held the roll together. The court record indicates that many of the RTAL rolls were incomplete. At the end of many rolls, where the final vote tally is printed for candidates, the figures were missing. The explanation from election officials was that many of the rolls were incomplete because they had most likely been changed during the election process, the machines had simply run out of paper, or the paper rolls were damaged or ripped. Mercuri estimated that between 5-10% of the machines either had not printed an ending vote tally or that tally was simply missing. The court record shows that specific machines lacked the end print out tallies. These machines include #5152130, #5157287, #5153310, #5153871, and #5159550, among others. Another machine, #5151765, had a blank RTAL. Not to be outdone, machine #5155228 printed out all zeros. A fair and unbiased audit is impossible to conduct under these circumstances. Karen Cotton, the administrator for the Franklin County BOE, tried to explain away the fact that many RTALs had not been signed by poll workers. Cotton claimed that the "paper may have jammed" making it impossible to sign the vote tally. Mercuri testified under oath that "I did not observe any [RTALs] that were signed at all." So, in the Squire v. Geer race, an uncertified system that was incapable of being audited produced unexpected election results. And the Board of Elections officials responsible for ensuring free, fair and unbiased elections failed to safeguard the people’s votes. The real RTALs, or voter verified paper trails, prove to be worthless for audit purposes in an election where 90,000 votes were in question, according to the court record. -- Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman are co-authors of HOW THE GOP STOLE AMERICA'S 2004 ELECTION & IS RIGGING 2008, available at www.freepress.org. Email this article to a friend |
Don't forget to check out articles from 2007 and 2008
"Nonviolent resisters put Senator Clinton on notice"
December 23, 2007
Pete Perry
"In-depth, post-EVEREST interview with Ohio's Secretary of State"
December 21, 2007
Brad Friedman
"The phrase that could defeat Hillary Clinton"
December 19, 2007
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Ohio will likely face big vote-counting problems in 2008"
December 19, 2007
Steven Rosenfeld
""Critical security failures" leads Ohio Sec. of State to recommend ban of DRE (touch-screen) voting machines"
December 17, 2007
Brad Friedman
"Ohio Secretary of State confirms 2004 election could have been stolen"
December 14, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"Kucinich first, Edwards second in PDA straw poll"
December 7, 2007
Tim Carpenter
"Hillary and the politics of disappointment"
December 2, 2007
Paul Rogat Loeb
"Voting can be a real battle for U.S. troops and others overseas in the 2008 primaries"
December 2, 2007
Loretta (Laurie) Ahlrich
"Wolf Blitzer loses Democratic debate"
November 20, 2007
David Swanson
"Another Clinton campaign fraud"
November 15, 2007
David Swanson
"We remember… Nov. 2 memorial anniversary of the 2004 Ohio election"
November 6, 2007
Paddy Shaffer
"The weak slat under the bed of democracy"
October 31, 2007
Michael Winship
"Aurora Dairy exemption from check-off program challenged; USDA should demand retroactive payment from faux organic milk producers"
October 31, 2007
Mark Kastel
"Kucinich tops other Dem Presidential leaders in key CA straw poll"
October 30, 2007
David Swanson
"Will the GOP election theft machine do it again in 2008?"
October 19, 2007
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman
"Exactly how the good guys finally won"
October 2, 2007
David Swanson
"Voter purging: a legal way for Republicans to swing elections?"
September 16, 2007
Steven Rosenfeld
"Why doesn't the GOP want Ohio's voting machines tested?"
September 11, 2007
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman
"The Cat in the Hat, elusive happy endings, and the [election] mess that is so big, and so deep, and so tall"
September 9, 2007
Joan Brunwasser, OpEdNews
"The Death of the DRE: gone the way of Lawn Jarts"
September 3, 2007
Christopher Wilson
"Fooled Again series: exclusive interview with Michael Collins"
September 1, 2007
Joan Brunwasser, Voting Integrity editor, OpEdNews
"Fooled again series: exclusive interview with "Diebold whistleblower" Steve Heller"
August 27, 2007
Joan Brunwasser, Voting Integrity editor, OpEdNews
"The Dan Rather voting machine special, a recipe for election disaster, and serious food for thought"
August 24, 2007
Joan Brunwasser
"Resistance of one"
August 10, 2007
David Swanson
"The dog ate my homework continues: inter-office Ohio Board of Elections email prompted by SAVE THE BALLOTS website gives a glimpse into the attitudes of Ohio election officials"
August 9, 2007
Paddy Shaffer
"Look at who runs our boards of elections"
August 9, 2007
Richard Hayes Phillips, Ph.D.
"Restore health to America's elections and pull the plug on SDD virus threat"
August 8, 2007
Michael Richardson
"Paper ballots for California: Secretary of State announces de-certification/re-certification plans for e-voting systems"
August 4, 2007
Brad Friedman from Plano, TX, with help from Emily Levy of VelvetRevolution.us and Tom Courbat of SAVE R VOTE
"The dog ate my homework"
August 3, 2007
Richard Hayes Phillips and Patricia "Paddy" Shaffer
"Welcome to jail for destruction of election records… for some of the ladies and gentlemen of the Ohio Boards of Elections!"
August 3, 2007
Paddy Shaffer
"The criminal cover-up of Ohio's stolen 2004 election sinks to the fraudulent, the absurd, the pathetic"
August 2, 2007
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman
"Part II – Squire v. Geer: Facts the Magistrate left out are even more shocking than the ones he included"
July 30, 2007
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman
"Will Bush cancel the 2008 election?"
July 30, 2007
Harvey Wasserman & Bob Fitrakis
"Ohio's 2004 presidential election records missing or destroyed"
July 30, 2007
Steven Rosenfeld
"Sausage making and electronic voting machines"
July 27, 2007
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman
"Shreds of evidence"
July 26, 2007
Richard Hayes Phillips, Ph.D.
"Missing records and record access in Ohio, July 2007"
July 25, 2007
Paddy Shaffer
"On-site observations of the hand-counting of paper ballots and recommendations for the general election of 2008"
July 24, 2007
Sheila Parks
"Sicko ?"
July 3, 2007
Joan Brunwasser, OpEdNews
"John Edwards supports "open source" for voting systems"
June 27, 2007
Alan Dechert
"Will electronic voting reform create new ways to steal elections?"
June 6, 2007
Steven Rosenfeld
"US Attorney resigns following Conyers’ request for BBC documents"
June 2, 2007
Greg Palast
"Will Al Gore face his inconvenient truths about our stolen elections?"
May 18, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"Giving the voters "poisoned food" to "nourish" democracy"
May 17, 2007
Marj Creech
"In the land of the free, and the home of the brave"
May 17, 2007
Paul R. Lehto
"The globalization of electronic election theft"
May 11, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"RFK: Rove and Rove's brain, 'Should be in jail,' not in office"
May 9, 2007
Greg Palast
"Introducing Psephos"
April 25, 2007
Paul R. Lehto
"Are Rove's missing e-mails the smoking guns of the stolen 2004 election?"
April 25, 2007
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman
"The GOP's cyber election hit squad"
April 22, 2007
Steven Rosenfeld and Bob Fitrakis
"Another path to peace: the case for Kucinich"
April 19, 2007
David Swanson
"Virtual election season"
April 16, 2007
David Swanson
"Bye bye to Cleveland GOP Election Chair Bob "Ballots for Bush" Bennett"
April 16, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"Bye bye to Cleveland GOP Election Chair Bob "Ballots for Bush" Bennett"
April 15, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"Auditing the mid-term election"
April 6, 2007
Richard Hayes Phillips
"Two big victories boost Ohio's election protection movement"
April 5, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"More potential 2004 election illegalities rock Ohio's Hocking County as Cleveland braces for a legal firestorm"
March 30, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"New Ohio evidence exposes apparently illegal 2004 recount activity by Hocking County's GOP Election Director, and a stinging complaint is filed in Cleveland"
March 26, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"Explosive new vote fraud developments continue to rock Ohio and Florida"
March 23, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"Forced resignations and stiff prison sentences intensify the escalating blowback from Ohio's 2004 stolen election"
March 20, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"Election fraud, my ass"
March 16, 2007
Paul Rogat Loeb
"After Ohio's recount rigging convictions in Cuyahoga, is Coshocton County next?"
March 6, 2007
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman
"Florida setting example"
March 3, 2007
Free Press staff
"Sequoia Voting Systems contract with San Francisco needs added section to ensure transparency"
February 13, 2007
Brent Turner, Open Voting Consortium
"Ohio's spreading stolen 2004 election scandal claims another victim"
February 10, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"First criminal convictions from Ohio's stolen 2004 election confirm recount was rigged"
January 27, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"Election attorneys amplify importance of convictions for recount rigging in Ohio 2004 presidential race"
January 26, 2007
Paul Lehto
"Do new Ohio recount prosecutions indicate unraveling of 2004 election theft cover-up?"
January 19, 2007
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman
"The mystic voting hall: for the love of democracy"
January 5, 2007
Sheri Myers
"DREs, magic and other sleights of hand"
January 4, 2007
Rady Ananda
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