 |
Fri Jul 03 2009 | |||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
Departments Election Issues First criminal convictions from Ohio's stolen 2004 election confirm recount was rigged by Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman January 27, 2007 The first felony convictions of two Cleveland poll workers stemming from Ohio's stolen 2004 election confirm that the official recount in that contested vote was, in the words of county prosecutors, "rigged." The question now is whether further prosecutions will reach higher up in the ranks of officials who may have been involved in illegalities throughout the rest of the state. The convictions have come down in Cuyahoga County, where Democratic candidates traditionally run up huge majorities. Suspicious vote counts and other irregularities cut deeply into John Kerry's margins in 2004. Official vote counts gave the state---and thus the presidency---to George W. Bush by about 118,000 votes out of 5.5 million counted. A statewide recount, paid for by the Green and Libertarian Parties, was marred in 87 of the state's 88 counties by the types of illegalities that led to this week's convictions. Only in Coshocton County was a full, manual recount performed. Throughout the rest of the state, under the direction of Republican Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell, mandatory random sampling was not done, as prescribed by law. Instead, poll workers illegally chose sample precincts for recounting where they knew there would be no problems, and then routinely recounted the rest of the ballots by machine, rendering the recount meaningless. Blackwell simultaneously served as state co-chair of the Bush-Cheney campaign. This fall he was defeated in his campaign for governor by Democrat Ted Strickland. County Prosecutor Kevin Baxter opened the Cuyahoga trial by charging that "the evidence will show that this recount was rigged, maybe not for political reasons, but rigged nonetheless." Baxter said three election workers "did this so they could spend a day rather than weeks or months" on the recount. "This was a very hush operation." Jacqueline Maiden, the county election board's third-ranking employee, and Kathleen Dreamer, an assistant manager, have each been convicted of a felony count of negligent misconduct and a misdemeanor count of failing to perform their duties. Rosie Grier, the board's ballot department manager, was acquitted on all seven counts raised against the three. Sentencing is scheduled for late February. Defense attorneys have indicated they will appeal. The felony conviction carries a possible sentence of six to 18 months. The county prosecutors have not yet alleged vote fraud. No do they say mishandling the recount affected the election's outcome. Dreamer's defense attorney, Roger Synenberg, said the defendants "were just doing [the recount] the way they were always doing it." But Cuyahoga's precinct-by-precinct vote counts and turnout numbers varied wildly and improbably. Several predominantly black precincts showed turnouts of less than 30% in a county where overall turnout was around 60%. One ward showed a 7% turnout as compared to surrounding precincts with turnouts nearly ten times as high. Further prosecutions may now hinge on what Maiden and Dreamer might tell prosecutors about the role played by higher-ups. The assumption is widespread that the decision to consciously designate test precincts, rather than choose them at random, must have been at least tacitly approved by Secretary of State Blackwell. In Cleveland, Robert Bennett, chair of the state's Republican Party, also served as chair of the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections. Cuyahoga BOE Executive Director Michael Vu was chosen by the county Democratic Party. Under Vu's direction, the county's elections have been rife with chaos, irregularities and apparent fraud. When the Democrats recently tried to remove him from his post, Vu was supported by Bennett and the Republican Party. He kept his job when Blackwell strategically abstained from a key removal vote. There is growing evidence that what happened in Cleveland was the rule, rather than the exception, in Ohio's 2004 presidential recount. Sworn testimony at a public hearing in Toledo indicates Diebold technicians were involved in picking "random" precincts to be recounted there. A memory card was apparently lacking from at least one optiscan machines. Miami County election officials admit they merely ran the optiscan ballots through the ES 550 counter, rather than doing the prescribed random recounts. Free Press reporters have found recount results varied signficantly from official results, which should have triggered a hand recount of all the ballots in the county. This was never done in Miami or in any other Ohio County except Coshocton. Handwritten field notes from Paddy Shaffer, the Green/Libertarian Recount Coordinator in Delaware County in 2004, call into question the role played by ES&S technician Sam Hogsett. On December 15, 2004, Shaffer recorded at 2:42pm that Hogsett was "...tapping tabulator machine on left. There are two machines in the room. Kim [Spangler] says he is doing this because the light/the switch keeps going out. He has now handled the machines multiple times." At 4:25pm, Shaffer recorded "ES&S tech Sam Hogsett back on the machine and touching the ballots. They are working on Genoa precincts. My intuition is screaming get him away from the ballots and machines. ... He continued moving around the machines, stacking in the ballots." At 5:05pm Shaffer noted "Sam is back loading and stacking. Throughout much of this time, Sam is the one to call out the precinct total and the name." Sam Hogsett is more than an ES&S technician according to Shaffer and others who investigated him, who have found his letters to the editor quite alarming. Voting rights activists troubled by Hogsett's role in the recount found letters posted under the name Sam Hogsett, Crown City, at the southeatern Ohio newspaper website www.herald-dispatch.com. One of the letters begins as follows: "I recently read in this pitifully left-leaning editorial section that the spineless, thoughtless, moral less useless left-wing liberal America hater Robert Sheer is unsuccessfully attempting to use an apples-to-oranges comparison to wrongfully attack our Second Amendment rights." Hogsett goes on to write: "... He [Sheer] believes that if I were to take a Smith and Wesson and blast his little pea brain to bits, that his family should be able to sue the manufacturer and the gun dealer who sold it to me." Initially, Delaware County Prosecutor Dave Yost obtained a temporary restraining order stopping the recount in Delaware County on November 23, 2004. The Delaware Gazette noted a complaint from Shaffer about the role Hogsett played in the recount as a private voting machine company technician, and in a report dated January 1, 2005, Shaffer wrote the Delaware County Board of Elections that John Myers of the Delaware County Democratic Party said that, "He was very pleased that unlike many counties that are at the mercy of computer technicians, Delaware is not. He [Myers] said during both conversations, even repeated over and over, that they do their own programming. So why was Sam Hogsett needed? Why involve the technician in the process of the recount?" Board of Elections records in Fairfield County document that when the recount was not matching thus mandating a full handcount under Ohio law, the Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell's office recommended that Sam Hogsett be brought in to deal with the discrepancies between the official count and the recount. After Hogsett arrived and took charge of the recount as a private ES&S technician, the vote matched perfectly for the first time. In Athens and Auglaize Counties, BOE workers who attempted to blow the whistle on apparent election irregularities were forced out of their jobs. Overall, the illegalities prompting these initial convictions in Cuyahoga County appear to be the rule rather than the exception in the handling of the Ohio 2004 recount statewide. The question now is whether parallel prosecutions will follow in other counties. And whether such prosecutions might include those who are likely to have ordered or approved the illegalities that marred the recount in Cleveland, and throughout the rest of the state. -- Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman are co-authors of HOW THE GOP STOLE AMERICA'S 2004 ELECTION & IS RIGGING 2008 (http://www.freepress.org/), and, with Steve Rosenfeld, of WHAT HAPPENED IN OHIO?, published by the New Press. Email this article to a friend |
Don't forget to check out articles from 2008 and 2009
"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
Read Articles by Year:
2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 2000
All content © 1970-2009
The Columbus Free Press
Disclaimer