Vote Manipulation: Can Electonic Voting Machines and their keepers be trusted?

Source: www.voterga.org - A SOS Investigative Report of the election, SEB meeting transcripts and court documents from a former commission chair candidate paint a remarkable picture of election manipulation.

Douglas County Vote Manipulation for 25,000 Election Day Ballots

Douglas County commission chairman, Tom Worthan, was elected in 2004. In January of 2008, Chairman Worthan authorized Laurie Fulton to take the Elected Officials Certified Training Course (EOCT) from the office of the Secretary of State. In March of 2008, Bill Hembree, a State Representative from Douglas, introduced HB1437, to create a County Board of Elections and merge the voting registrar and elections supervisor positions. It was signed into Law in May of 2008. Section 8 of the bill requires actions and decisions by the board to be by majority vote. In May of 2008, Tom Worthan attained the resignation of elections supervisor, David Akers, and hired Laurie Fulton to be the elections supervisor. In April 2008, after a year of campaigning, James Quarterman filed to challenge Worthan in the general election. In June of 2008, the county conducted primaries with correct ballots and no major incidents.

For the general election, Laurie Fulton placed a noticed that appeared in the Douglas County Sentinel newspaper on September 14, 2008. It notified the public that logic and accuracy testing would begin September 19, 2008.

On September 19, 2008 logic and accuracy testing was performed and completed only on the 12 machines used for early voting. On October 14-17 of 2008, logic and accuracy testing was supposedly performed on all 300+ machines used for the general election without any other public notice. The county provided custodian certifications but no service contract for the Oct. 14-17 2008 testing performed by five Diebold technicians.

When preparing ballots during August of 2008 for the 2008 general election, Laurie Fulton did not include the middle initial of a candidate for sheriff on the ballot as indicated on his notice of candidacy. After logic and accuracy testing on September 19, 2008, the candidate, Derrick Broughton, informed Laurie Fulton that his middle initial was missing from the ballot. In September of 2008, Laurie Fulton contacted state elections director, Wes Tailor, about the ballot naming problem. He confirmed in the August 27, 2009 SEB meeting that he advised her not to create a second ballot because the ballot is not required to have middle initials. However, after the September 19 testing, Laurie Fulton contacted Kennesaw State University and they created another ballot and database for it anyway. In October of 2008, Laurie Fulton created the second unauthorized ballot with the correct full name of the sheriff, despite being advised against doing that by the State Elections Director, Tailor. The second ballot was never approved by the SOS office as an official ballot. It is essentially an illegal ballot that allowed officials to manually enter the Election Day results rather than automatically accumulate them.

On Election Night Nov. 2, the GEMS server would only read the first official ballot created but not the second unauthorized ballot. Therefore, it reported only 30,008 of the 55,197 votes cast. The votes on the second ballot were accumulated manually on election night. Laurie Fulton and board member, John Lawrence, worked by themselves from 12 midnight to 5am when the election results were produced. Procedures used to accumulate the results are still unclear. On Election Night, several challengers thought that they had won their local races with nearly all precincts reporting but the next morning most were reported to have lost. The county reported the certified election results on Nov. 7th to the Secretary of State but those results were only certified by one board member, not all members as required by law. Supervisor Fulton also failed to include 67 absentee ballots in the certified results for the Nov. 4th general election.

The race for tax commissioner had a margin of less than 1%, and a recount was performed. (The initial certified results were: Todd Cowan: 26,250, Henry Mitchell: 26,085). Between Nov. 12th and Nov. 14th, county elections officials recounted all races and included the votes of 67 missing absentee ballots in the recount although the other recounted races were never certified. Eight different Diebold contractors appear to have participated in the testing, certification, accumulation and recount activities but no evidence was produced to indicate that they were sworn as custodians to uphold the law.

The recount started on Nov. 12 when a Premier contractor entered the results manually into the GEMS server and produced reports of election results. Officials then tried to match them to the results that were created on election night. The contractor stated that board member, John Lawrence, “was not satisfied with some of the results”. On Nov 13th, she began to manually enter the results but the board did not agree and instructed her to make a spreadsheet of results for the manually counted votes. The contractor left the spreadsheet and the reports with Mr. Lawrence, so that he could take them home overnight on Nov. 13th to review. When she returned on Nov. 14th, the spreadsheet then had acceptable results and she was instructed to begin entry of them into the GEMS server. When she was done there were two races that did not match the results that were created manually on election night but she indicated they were able to “fix it”. John Lawrence and Laurie Fulton then stated that they were satisfied with the results. On Nov. 14th after the recount, the county reported certified results only for the tax commissioner’s race. Henry Mitchell’s vote count had decreased to 26,065 even though there were 67 new absentee ballots in the results.

The supervisor and some members of the County Elections Board decided NOT to certify the recounted votes for all of the other races submitted to the Secretary of State. Supervisor Fulton notified the office of the Secretary of State on December 15, 2008 that the reported results were not certified. State Elections Director, Wes Tailor continued to request the certified results for all races through January 30, 2009, as indicated by his January 28 letter that was received by Laurie Fulton on the 30th. When the investigator attempted to interview the contractor who was involved in the manual entry on election night, a family member told him that he was in the hospital with a serious medical problem and did not know if the contractor would ever be able to contact the investigator. The SOS IG office made no attempt to verify whether or not that was true.

On Nov 5th Mr. Quarterman and Mr. Broughton requested the board for a recount of their election results. They received a stamped copy of Mr. Quarterman’s request. He was told to wait until the votes were certified. The elections results were certified by the Secretary of State’s office on November 13th, 2008. Mr. Quarterman issued a challenge of the elections results on Nov 17th, 2008. At trial on Jan. 5th, 2009, Laurie Fulton was unable to establish the certification date by producing a copy of the certified election results that were sent to the Secretary of State. The judge halted the trial and told her to get a copy of the certified results from the office of the Secretary of State although it was required to be on file with the County Elections Board and Clerk of Superior Court of Douglas County. Hours later, Ms. Fulton returned with a copy of the initial certified results that was not signed by all board members as required by law. It could also not possibly have been correct because the Secretary of State’s office was still waiting for the certified results. Nevertheless, the judge ruled that his challenge on Nov. 17th was past the five day limit of when the county initially certified its results on the Nov 7th.

Mr. Quarterman appealed his case to the Georgia Supreme Court. In January of 2010, a year after the original trial, the court upheld the lower court’s decision. Only one race of the votes cast for the 67 absentee has ever been certified. Had all votes been certified as required by law, the challenge by Mr. Quarterman would have to be allowed and the Election Night vote manipulation procedures would have been more readily exposed.

The Deputy AG never charged the board member with manipulating the results or the county with creating an illegal ballot and willfully failing to certify the election. The elections supervisor had a political motivation to ensure that the Commission Chairman who appointed her was reelected. The Commission Chairman and some of the Board of Commissioners had a special vested interest in ensuring their reelection. In 2006, they implemented a retirement plan that allowed elected officials to receive a pension of roughly $30,000-$40,000 per year for life after five years of service in office.

On Nov 5th Mr. Quarterman and Mr. Broughton requested the board for a
recount of their election results. They received a stamped copy of Mr.
Quarterman’s request. He was told to wait until the votes were
certified. The elections results were certified by the Secretary of
State’s office on November 13th, 2008. Mr. Quarterman issued a
challenge of the elections results on Nov 17th, 2008. At trial on Jan.
5th, 2009, Laurie Fulton was unable to establish the certification
date by producing a copy of the certified election results that were
sent to the Secretary of State. The judge halted the trial and told
her to get a copy of the certified results from the office of the
Secretary of State although it was required to be on file with the
County Elections Board and Clerk of Superior Court of Douglas County.
Hours later, Ms. Fulton returned with a copy of the initial certified
results that was not signed by all board members as required by law.
It could also not possibly have been correct because the Secretary of
State’s office was still waiting for the certified results.
Nevertheless, the judge ruled that his challenge on Nov. 17th was past
the five day limit of when the county initially certified its results
on the Nov 7th.

Mr. Quarterman appealed his case to the Georgia Supreme Court. In
January of 2010, a year after the original trial, the court upheld the
lower court’s decision. Only one race of the votes cast for the 67
absentee has ever been certified. Had all votes been certified as
required by law, the challenge by Mr. Quarterman would have to be
allowed and the Election Night vote manipulation procedures would have
been more readily exposed.

The Deputy AG never charged the board member with manipulating the
results or the county with creating an illegal ballot and willfully
failing to certify the election. The elections supervisor had a
political motivation to ensure that the Commission Chairman who
appointed her was reelected. The Commission Chairman and some of the
Board of Commissioners had a special vested interest in ensuring their
reelection. In 2006, they implemented a retirement plan that allowed
elected officials to receive a pension of roughly $30,000-$40,000 per
year for life after five years of service in office.

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