Advertisement
On October 25 Washoe County resident and voter Patricia Axelrod sued Sequoia Voting Systems for the loss of her 2004 vote, which she says, is her “precious and personal private property.” Sequoia Voting Systems sold Nevada electronic voting, election management, and Vote tabulating machines and systems to Nevada including the Advantage and AVC Edge with Veri-Vote Printer voting machines. “Sequoia management and product defect and negligence lost my 2004 vote, impaired the accurate results of both the 2004 and threatens the outcome of the 2006 elections,” says Patricia Axerod a professional researcher who has sued Sequoia for negligence, property damage, negligence, strict product liability and breech of the warranty Sequoia extended to Nevada. Axelrod discovered her missing 2004 vote by review of her voting record on Washoe Registrar’s DEMS (Diebold Election Management System). Accessing the DEMS computer she found her vote had neither been registered nor counted and that she had been issued 3 – rather than one unique Voter ID number. Axelrod is asking Washoe’s Second Judicial District Court for damages in excess of $10,000.00 and to order the public testing of all Washoe County Sequoia voting and election machines as well as to fix defective machines as discovered. Additionally she requests the court to order Sequoia to allow citizen oversight of its Washoe operations in addition to the company’s adoption of fair vote election regulations and standards. Axelrod says she will forgo financial remuneration in return for Sequoia’s test and fix remedy and provision for citizen oversight.
Axelrod investigated the 2004 election results; suing Nevada Secretary of State Dean Heller for access to and copies of the 2004 election records and documents kept in the Secretary’s files. She says she also obtained information and documents from other informed sources.
Most importantly, says Axelrod, she obtained the Wyle Laboratory December 2004 test results of the AVC Edge with VeriVote printer that she and other Washoe citizens and most of Nevada voted on in 2004; and will again in 2006. Wyle tested the machines for reliability and certified the AVC machine suitable for Nevada voter use. Axelrod says Wyle’s operational, test and evaluation records reveal that test machines “ failed to operate when subjected to electrical surge, electromagnetic radiation and electrostatic discharge; overall standard reliability testing failed at 4, 8, and 10 hours causing the machine to lock up; VeriVote printers slipped out of alignment and/or repeatedly jammed and stopped printing even though the machines read “Printing Ballot Selections; and VeriVote Printing paper folded up on itself accordion style”. Axelrod also says, “Wyle engineers found that, “ongoing review of individual VeriVote paper receipts produced during testing show that a font size change had occurred on multiple occasions which in turn caused some of the information on the printer receipt to be found missing.” Axelrod also says that, “Wyle Laboratory suppressed and failed to print out VeriVote serial number data of machines under test so that printed rolls could not be traced back to the specific machine from which the voter receipts were printed. Sequoia attorney Adolph Romei has threatened Axelrod with sanctions for pursuing this lawsuit but Axelrod declares that she will not be dissuaded from seeking Election Justice.
Axelrod investigated the 2004 election results; suing Nevada Secretary of State Dean Heller for access to and copies of the 2004 election records and documents kept in the Secretary’s files. She says she also obtained information and documents from other informed sources.
Most importantly, says Axelrod, she obtained the Wyle Laboratory December 2004 test results of the AVC Edge with VeriVote printer that she and other Washoe citizens and most of Nevada voted on in 2004; and will again in 2006. Wyle tested the machines for reliability and certified the AVC machine suitable for Nevada voter use. Axelrod says Wyle’s operational, test and evaluation records reveal that test machines “ failed to operate when subjected to electrical surge, electromagnetic radiation and electrostatic discharge; overall standard reliability testing failed at 4, 8, and 10 hours causing the machine to lock up; VeriVote printers slipped out of alignment and/or repeatedly jammed and stopped printing even though the machines read “Printing Ballot Selections; and VeriVote Printing paper folded up on itself accordion style”. Axelrod also says, “Wyle engineers found that, “ongoing review of individual VeriVote paper receipts produced during testing show that a font size change had occurred on multiple occasions which in turn caused some of the information on the printer receipt to be found missing.” Axelrod also says that, “Wyle Laboratory suppressed and failed to print out VeriVote serial number data of machines under test so that printed rolls could not be traced back to the specific machine from which the voter receipts were printed. Sequoia attorney Adolph Romei has threatened Axelrod with sanctions for pursuing this lawsuit but Axelrod declares that she will not be dissuaded from seeking Election Justice.