Proof of Ohio Election Fraud Exposed
By William Rivers Pitt
Wednesday 15 December 2004
Also see below: Affidavit of Evelyn Roberson
Lawmaker Seeks Inquiry into Ohio Vote
Among activists and investigators looking into
allegations of vote fraud in the 2004 Presidential
election, the company always mentioned was Diebold and its suspicious electronic touch-screen voting
machines. It is Diebold that has multiple avowed Republicans on its Board of Directors. It was Diebold that gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to Bush’s election campaign. It was Diebold CEO Walden O’Dell who vowed to deliver Ohio’s electoral votes to Bush.
As it turns out, everyone was looking the wrong way.
The company that requires immediate and penetrating
scrutiny is Triad Systems.
Triad is owned by a man named Tod Rapp, who has also
donated money to both the Republican Party and the
election campaign of George W. Bush. Triad
manufactures punch-card voting systems, and also wrote the computer program that tallied the punch- card votes cast in 41 Ohio counties last November. This Triad company graphic displays the counties where their machines are used:
Given the ubiquity of the Triad voting systems in
Ohio, the allegations that have been leveled against this
company strike to the heart of the assumed result of
the 2004 election.
Earlier this week, the allegations against triad were
first raised by Green Party candidate David Cobb, who
testified at a hearing held in Columbus, Ohio by Rep.
John Conyers of the House Judiciary Committee. In his
testimony, Cobb stated:
Mr. Chairman, though our time is limited, I must bring
to the committee's attention the most recent and
perhaps most troubling incident that was related to my
campaign on Sunday, December 12, about a shocking
event that occurred last Friday, December 10.
A representative from Triad Systems came into a county
board of elections office un-announced. He said he was
just stopping by to see if they had any questions
about the up-coming recount. He then headed into the back room where the Triad supplied Tabulator (a card reader and older PC with custom software) is kept. He told them there was a problem and the system had a bad
battery and had "lost all of its data". He then took
the computer apart and started swapping parts in and
out of it and another "spare" tower type PC also in
the room. He may have had spare parts in his coat as one of the BOE people moved it and remarked as to how very heavy it was. He finally re-assembled everything and said it was working but to not turn it off.
He then asked which precinct would be counted for the
3% recount test, and the one which had been selected
as it had the right number of votes, was relayed to him.
He then went back and did something else to the
tabulator computer.
The Triad Systems representative suggested that since
the hand count had to match the machine count exactly,
and since it would be hard to memorize the several
numbers which would be needed to get the count to come out exactly right, that they should post this series
of numbers on the wall where they would not be noticed by observers. He suggested making them look like employee information or something similar. The people doing the hand count could then just report these numbers no matter what the actual count of the ballots revealed. This would then "match" the tabulator report for this precinct exactly. The numbers were apparently the final certified counts for the selected precinct.
Triad is contracted to do much of the elections work
in this county and elsewhere in Ohio. This included
programming the candidates into the tabulator, and
coming up with the rotation of candidates in the
various precincts (that is, the order of which
candidate is first changes between precincts). They
also have a technician in the office on election night
to actually run the tabulator itself.
Triad also supplies the network computers on which all
of the voter registration information and processing
is kept for the county.
It was unusual for the computers to be taken apart. At
least one member of the Board of Elections was told
the tabulator was in pieces when he called to check on the office.
The source of this report believes that the Triad
representative was "making the rounds" of visiting
other counties also before the recount. This person
also stated they would not pass on the suggestion of
the "posted" hidden totals, and would refuse to go
along with it if it were suggested by the others in
the office at the time.
The source of this information believes they could
lose their job if they come forward.
The source of this information is named Sherole Eaton,
Hocking County deputy director of elections. She has
since written and signed an affidavit describing her
experience with the Triad representative, the text of
which is here:
AFFIDAVIT December 13, 2004 Sherole Eaton
Re: General Election 2004 - Hocking County,
TriAd Dell Computer about 14 years old - No tower
On Friday, December 10 2004, Michael from TriAd called
in the AM to inform us that he would be in our office
in the PM on the same day. I asked him why he was
visiting us. He said, "to check out your tabulator,
computer, and that the attorneys will be asking some
tricky questions and he wanted to go over some of the
questions they maybe ask." He also added that there
would be no charge for this service.
He arrived at about 12:30PM. I hung his coat up and it
was very heavy. I made a comment about it being so
heavy. He, Lisa Schwartze and I chatted for a few
minutes. He proceeded to go to the room where our
computer and tabulation machine is kept. I followed
him into the room. I had my back to him when he turned the computer on. He stated that the computer was not
coming up. I did see some commands at the lower left hand of the screen but no menu. He said that the battery in the computer was dead and that the stored information was gone. He said that he could put a patch on it and fix it. My main concern was - what if this happened when we were ready to do the recount. He proceeded to take the computer apart and call his offices to get information to input into our computer. Our computer is fourteen years old and as far as I know had always worked in the past. I asked him if the older computer, that is in the same room. could be used for the recount. I don't remember exactly what he said but I did relay to him that the computer was old and a spare. At some point he asked if he could take the spare computer apart and I said "yes". He took both computers apart. I don't remember seeing any tools and he asked Sue Wallace, Clerk, for a screwdriver. She got it for him. At this point I was frustrated about the computer not performing and feared that it wouldn't work for the recount. I called Gerald Robinette, board chairman, to inform him regarding the computer problem and asked him if we could have Tri Ad come to our offices to run the program and tabulator for the recount. Gerald talked on the phone with Michael and Michael assured Gerald that he could fix our computer. He worked on the computer until about 3:00 PM and then asked me which precinct and the number of the precinct we were going to count. I told him, Good Hope 1 # 17. He went back into the tabulation room. Shortly after that he (illegible) stated that the computer was ready for the recount and told us not to turn the computer off so it would charge up.
Before Lisa ran the tests, Michael said to turn the
computer off. Lisa said, " I thought you said we
weren't supposed to turn it off." He said turn it off
and right back on and it should come up. It did come
up and Lisa ran the tests. Michael gave us instructions
on how to explain the rotarien, what the tests mean, etc.
No advice on how to handle the attorneys but to have
our Prosecuting Attorney at the recount to answer any
of their legal questions. He said not to turn the
computer off until after the recount.
He advised Lisa and I on how to post a "cheat sheet"
on the wall so that only the board members and staff
would know about it and and what the codes meant so the count would come out perfect and we wouldn't have to do a full hand recount of the county. He left about 5:00 PM.
My faith in Tri Ad and the Xenia staff has been
nothing but good. The realization that this company and staff would do anything to dishonor or disrupt the voting
process is distressing to me and hard to believe. I'm
being completely objective about the above statements
and the reason I'm bringing this forward is to,
hopefully, rule out any wrongdoing.
Further buttressing Eaton’s claim is an addendum to a
previous affidavit filed by Evelyn Roberson who, you
may recall, was involved in the Greene County recount
action that was summarily shut down by Ohio Secretary
of State Blackwell. Her addendum reads as follows:
Addendum to Declaration of Evelyn Roberson dated
December 12, 2004 Re: Incidents of December 10, 2004
This is to add to the approximately 1 :15 p.m. portion
of the visit with the Deputy Director of Elections Lyn
McCoy with respect to the following comment:
"She said they would have their computer technician
check over their computers on Monday in case they has
been tampered with."
the addition is that Lyn McCoy also mentioned to me at
the same time that her computer technician was with
Triad.
I declare under penalty of perjury the forgoing is
true and correct.
Dated: December 14, 2004
Evelyn Roberson
Original versions of these documents should be
available later on Wednesday on the website of Rep.
Conyers.
Conyers, upon hearing these allegations, sent a letter
to both the FBI Special Agent in Charge in Ohio and
the Hocking County Prosecutor. The text of that letter is
as follows:
December 15, 2004
As part of the Democratic staff's investigation into
irregularities in the 2004 election and following up
on a lead provided to me by Green Party Presidential
Candidate, David Cobb, I have learned that Sherole
Eaton, a Deputy Director of Board of Elections in
Hocking County, Ohio, has first hand knowledge of
inappropriate and likely illegal election tampering in
the Ohio presidential election in violation of federal
and state law.
I have information that similar actions of this nature
may be occurring in other counties in Ohio. I am
therefore asking that you immediately investigate this
alleged misconduct and that, among other things, you
consider the immediate impoundment of election
machinery to prevent any further tampering.
On December 13, my staff met with Ms. Eaton who
explained to them that last Friday, December 10,
Michael Barbian, Jr., a representative of Triad GSI
unilaterally sought and obtained access to the voting
machinery and records in Hocking County, Ohio,
modified the computer tabulator, learned which precinct was planned to be the subject of the initial test recount
and made further alterations based on that
information, and advised the election officials how to manipulate the machinery so that the preliminary hand recount matched the machine count. Ms. Eaton first relayed this information to Green Party representatives, and then completed, signed and notarized an affidavit describing this course of events, a copy of which is attached.
The Triad official sought access to the voting
machinery based on the apparent pretext that he wanted to review some "legal questions" the officials might receive as part of the recount process. At several
times during this visit, Mr. Barbian telephoned into
Triad's offices to obtain programming information
relating to the machinery and the precinct in
question. I have subsequently learned that Triad officials have been, or are in the process of intervening in several other counties in Ohio - Greene and Monroe, and perhaps others (see attached).
There are several important considerations you should
be aware of with respect to this matter. First, this
course of conduct would appear to violate several
provisions of federal law, in addition to the
constitutional guarantees of equal protection and due
process. 42 U.S.C. §1973 provides for criminal
penalties against any person who, in any election for
federal office, "knowingly and willfully deprives,
defrauds, or attempts to defraud the residents of a
State of a fair and impartially conducted election
process, by . . . the procurement, casting, or
tabulation of ballots that are known by the person to
be materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent under
the laws of the State in which the election is held."
42 U.S.C. § 1974 also requires the retention and
preservation, for a period of twenty-two months from
the date of a federal election, of all voting records
and papers and makes it a felony for any person to
"willfully steal, destroy, conceal, mutilate, or
alter" any such record. Further, any tampering with ballots and/or election machinery would violate the
constitutional rights of all citizens to vote and have
their votes properly counted, as guaranteed by the
Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the
Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Second, the course of conduct would also appear to
violate several provisions of Ohio law. No less than 4
provisions of the Ohio Revised Code make it a felony
to tamper with or destroy election records or machines. 1 Clearly, modifying election equipment in order to make sure that the hand count matches the machine count would appear to fall within these proscriptions.
Moreover, bringing in Triad officials into other Ohio
Counties would also appear to violate Ohio Revised
Code § 3505.32 which provides that during a period of
official canvassing, all interaction with ballots must
be "in the presence of all of the members of the board
and any other persons who are entitled to witness the
official canvass," given that last Friday, the Ohio
Secretary of State has issued orders to the effect
that election officials are to treat all election materials
as if they were in a period of canvassing,2 and that
"Teams of one Democrat and one Republican must be
present with ballots at all times of processing."
Third, it is important to recognize that the companies
implicated in the wrongdoing, Triad and its
affiliates, are the leading suppliers of voting machines involving the counting of paper ballots and punch cards in the critical states of Ohio and Florida. Triad is
controlled by the Rapp family, and its founder Tod A.
Rapp has been a consistent contributor to Republican
causes.4 A Triad affiliate, Psephos corporation,
supplied the notorious butterfly ballot used in Palm
Beach County, Florida, in the 2000 presidential
election.
Sincerely,
John Conyers, Jr.
Enclosures
cc: The Honorable F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr.
The New York Times published a report on the matter
late Tuesday night:
Lawmaker Seeks Inquiry into Ohio Vote By Tom Zeller
Jr.
The New York Times
Wednesday 15 December 2004
The ranking Democratic member of the House Judiciary
Committee, Representative John Conyers Jr. of
Michigan, plans to ask the Federal Bureau of Investigation and a county prosecutor in Ohio today to explore "inappropriate and likely illegal election tampering" in at least one and perhaps several Ohio counties.
The request for an investigation, made in a letter
that was also provided to The New York Times, includes
accounts from at least two county employees, but is
based largely on a sworn affidavit provided by the
Hocking County deputy director of elections, Sherole
Eaton.
Among other things, Ms. Eaton says in her affidavit
that a representative of Triad Governmental Systems,
the Ohio firm that created and maintains the vote-
counting software in dozens of Ohio counties, made
several adjustments to the Hocking County tabulator
last Friday, in advance of the state's recount, which
is taking place this week.
Ohio recount rules require that only 3 percent of a
county's votes be tallied by hand, and typically one
or more whole precincts are selected and combined to get the 3 percent sample. After the hand count, the sample is fed into the tabulator. If there is no discrepancy, the remaining ballots can be counted by the machine. Otherwise, a hand recount must be done for the whole county.
Ms. Eaton contends that the Triad employee asked which precinct Hocking County planned to count as its
representative 3 percent, and, upon being told, made
further adjustments to the machine.
County officials decided to use a different precinct
when the recount was done yesterday. No discrepancies were found.
"This is pretty outrageous," Mr. Conyers said. "We
want to pursue it as vigorously as we can."
But Brett Rapp, the president of Triad, said that
although it would be unusual for an employee to ask
about a specific precinct, preparing the machines for
a recount was standard procedure and was done in all 41 counties where Triad handles vote counts. He added
that he welcomed any investigation.
"I've been doing this since 1985, and in all my
experience this is the first time that we have had any
complaints whatsoever," Mr. Rapp said.
William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times and
international bestseller of two books - 'War on Iraq:
What Team Bush Doesn't Want You To Know' and 'The
Greatest Sedition is Silence.'
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