Posted this earlier, but not much attention, and wanted to give Ohioans a heads-up to contact their Reps and Senators about this.
http://www.theeveningleader.com/articles/2004/11/06/news/news.01.txt Saturday, November 6, 2004
Board awaits state followup
By ERIN MILLER
WAPAKONETA -- Auglaize County Board of Election members say they have not heard any more from the state regarding a possible investigation after receiving notice of being placed on administrative oversight last week.
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James Lee, spokesperson for the secretary of state's office, said last week the specific conditions of the administrative oversight and reasons for the oversight were available after Tuesday's election. ***
"These other issues will be addressed in the coming weeks," Lee said.
In a letter dated Oct. 21, Ken Nuss, former deputy director of the Auglaize County Board of Elections, claimed that Joe McGinnis, a former employee of Election Systems and Software (ES&S), the company that provides the voting system in Auglaize County, was on the main computer that is used to create the ballot and compile election results, which would go against election protocol. Nuss claimed in the letter that McGinnis was allowed to use the computer the weekend of Oct. 16.
Nuss, who resigned from his job Oct. 21 after being suspended for a day, was responsible for overseeing the computerized programming of election software, according to his job description. His resignation is effective Nov. 11.
(snip - a bit more) (didn't want to completely crash their site)
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Lots of other weird goings on in this rural Ohio county -- local Dem party chair endorsed w, forced to resign chair maybe Aug, didn't get an HQ til 2 weeks before the election, they knew they could get shit under the radar here. Also when I confronted Dir. just before registration deadline about fact that the "new" (more than 11 mo old) BOE address was not updated on the county website, or any of the local directories, she was really defensive. (Kept saying it was the county's job.) Found out later that it may have been a new phone number too. (when I voted absentee on Nov. 1 overheard receptionist say to caller something like "oh, yeah, that's the old number.") No sign on old address, nothin -- new (earlier) hours as well. They only verified my registration because I came in person.
Precinct changes shortly before the election. The little town I live in had 6 precincts voting in one polling place. They took 3 precincts from low income area, merged them to 2, and had them vote with the other 6. All on ES&S machines, which I thought were off the board. One of the 2 new precincts was a bellweather for Kerry, which I did the call lists for. Most of my lists were crossed off by 4pm some blocks of not yets, but doing well. My partners checking the other six mentioned that theirs were more disappointing. Remember hearing that Kerry campaign mentioned bad ground info from Ohio and thought this might have some bearing, but I have no clue how it would fit in the big picture.
I know the precinct changes couldn't have happened too far in advance of the election, since the call sheet were still divided into three sets -- making it a bitch to cross-verify. Although this could have something to do with the late setup of HQ, but still seems to me like that would pinpoint it later, but I don't know where to look for that -- probably can't find out without going there on Monday, which I'm perfectly willing to do.
And, the piece de resistance (sorry, can't do the French -- I mean Freedom -- thingies)...
The Ohio Revised Code
"§§§§ 3599.42. Prima-facie case of fraud
A violation of any provision of Title XXXV <35> of the Revised Code constitutes a prima-facie case of fraud within the purview of such title."
http://onlinedocs.andersonpublishing.com/oh/lpExt.dll?f=FifLink&t=document-frame.htm&l=jump&iid=227fc8b5.71da9d68.0.0&nid=15c01#JD_vlsection-0000-359942and
"§§§§ 3599.16. Misconduct of members or employees of board of elections
No member, director, or employee of a board of elections shall:
(A) Willfully or negligently violate or neglect to perform any duty imposed upon him by law, or willfully perform or neglect to perform it in such a way as to hinder the objects of the law, or willfully disobey any law incumbent upon him so to do; ***"
http://onlinedocs.andersonpublishing.com/oh/lpExt.dll?f=FifLink&t=document-frame.htm&l=jump&iid=227fc8b5.71da9d68.0.0&nid=15bcb#JD_vlsection-0000-359916heh heh heh... Blackwell, I have you in my sights...:evilgrin:
There may be a more directly applicable passage, I haven't had time to comb the code since I saw the story -- been disseminating it....
Anybody know anything about this Joe McGinnis guy? Thought the name sounded familiar but realized that was the name of the author of the Jeffrey McDonald investigation book.