Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Urgent: Appear in Court Tomorrow to Help Count the Votes!
Attend Hearing: 10AM Wednesday, January 14th
Pima County Superior Court 110 West Congress, 6th Floor
Judge Charles Harrington Court room- 4th floor, room 472.
Your Presence In Court Will Help Pima County Democratic Party Attorney Bill Risner Make the Case That the RTA Ballots Must Be Preserved.Let the Judge know it matters to you that your votes will be counted transparently! The fate of the RTA Ballots may be determined at this hearing!This case IS about the obligation of public oversight of elections central to maintaining a Constitutional Democracy.The Pima County Democratic Party position is that the Court does possess the legal and constitutional power to weigh the evidence brought forward by the Democratic Party that tampering did occur in the May 2006 RTA election and to order that the ballots be recounted under strict court supervision as the ONLY method that would confirm proof of election fraud. This case is NOT about a frivolous election challenge that the law requires to be filed within 5 days of election certification. The Pima County Treasurer filed this case to ask the Court to resolve the issue whether the County Treasurer must continue to preserve the ballots or have the ballots destroyed according to the law after 22 months.The case IS about upholding the rights of Arizonans to have ballots counted transparently! The Democratic Party filed Freedom of Information Act requests (FOIA) that uncovered evidence pointing to electronic election manipulation. Detection of evidence concealed in election data generated by computers requires lengthy forensic analysis that could not have be done in time to satisfy the narrow constraints of existing election law. Much of the evidence surfaced as a result of the Pima County Democratic Party vs. the Board of Supervisors public information lawsuit. The purpose is to persuade the Court to exercise its power to protect voters’ rights.The facts show that the intent of free, fair and transparent elections guaranteed by the Arizona Constitution are jeopardized by electronic elections when votes are counted secretly. Electronic elections require transparency and accountability precisely because it is so easy to manipulate and cover up evidence. The Court could be persuaded that current law prohibits a judicial remedy, therefore the Court has no power to intervene in what amounts to an election contest. Such a ruling would ignore the larger threat to democracy itself posed by computerized elections and set a damaging precedent that will undermine the rights of all Arizona citizens. ============
Labels: Bill Risner, court hearing, pima county election, Pima lawsuit, RTA ballots, RTA Tucson
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Friday, April 18, 2008
Attend April 21st, 9:30 am Court Hearing
Show Your Support for Election Transparency
Monday, April 21 9:30am
Judge Michael Miller’s Courtroom
Sixth Floor Pima County Superior Court
110 West Congress
Judge Miller’s ruling established a nationally significant precedent that established computerized election database records as public records. The Pima County Democratic Party pleading requested the release of all computerized databases. Although Judge Miller ordered databases from the 2006 primary and general elections released, Pima County attorneys fought to dictate the terms of the transfer. Pima County Democratic Party Chair Vince Rabago and Attorney Bill Risner won that skirmish, forcing the county technical staff to transfer data to a new laptop out of the box, to prevent any corruption of data in public view of a video camera. Only a united expression of multipartisan objection stopped the Board of Supervisors from following the County Attorney’s advice to appeal Judge Miller’s ruling. In face of public opposition the Board reversed itself and agreed to release the database from the RTA election because citizens stood up and demanded to be listened to.
Monday’s Hearing will focus on release of the rest of the election databases from 1995 going forward. Release of all databases will allow computer analysts at the University of Arizona to analyze all Pima County computerized databases to facilitate the development of a software tool capable of detecting irregularities in computer data that need further investigation. Depositions from top national computer security experts with election experience concur that there is no security risk from releasing data from past elections. Yet County Administrator Chuck Huckleberry has thrown up a smokescreen by misrepresenting the facts to justify withholding public records.
Transparent elections depend upon the release databases after every election.
Sandra Spangler
Acting Chair, Pima County Democratic Party Election Integrity Committee
Labels: Arizona elections, Chuck Huckeberry, court hearing, election fraud, Judge Miller, pima county election
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