Defend America's Democracy

Started by Adam_Fulford, Feb 28 06 01:10

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Adam_Fulford

[SPAN class=updatehead][FONT face=Verdana color=#ff0000]2-28-06: Take action NOW: Bullies pounding on whistleblower[/FONT][/SPAN]

"[Steven] Heller is getting pounded. He's the victim of bullies; a huge, powerful, wealthy, politically connected corporation and their equally huge and powerful international law firm are slamming him, grinding him up in legal machinery for allegedly lifting up the pretty skirt Diebold shows to the world, exposing the dirty, stinking criminal secrets that lie beneath.

"For what he's alleged to have done, there was nothing in it for him. No financial gain (in fact a serious financial loss, because he got fired from his job, and he's had to pay 10s of thousands of dollars to his lawyers, and owes them 10s of thousands more). And he's now at risk of over 3 years in state prison. It's insane. His cause is a worthy one, and he needs our help. Please call, write and email today.

Email the Los Angeles District Attorney's office at [A href="mailto:[email protected]"][FONT color=#323232][email protected][/FONT][/A].

A good old fashioned snail mail letter is very powerful tool:

District Attorney's Office
County of Los Angeles
210 West Temple Street, Suite 18000
Los Angeles, CA 90012-3210

And of course, phone calls:

Telephone (213) 974-3512
Fax (213) 974-1484
TTY (800) 457-7778 (8:30am - 5:00pm M-F)

(From Huffington Post):
[A href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-soby-jr/whistleblower-charged-wit_b_16411.html" target=_blank][FONT color=#000000]MORE: Whistleblower story [/FONT][/A]

Bradblog: [A href="http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002472.htm" target=_blank][FONT color=#000000]The Whistleblower story[/FONT][/A]

And while you're at Bradblog, check out these important stories:

Candid America project in action - Citizen catches election official on tape:
[A href="http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002473.htm" target=_blank][FONT color=#000000]Pima County official rushes at a citizen for asking about Diebold contract[/FONT][/A]

[A href="http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002467.htm" target=_blank][FONT color=#000000]Squealing like a stuck pig[/FONT][/A] - Alaska officials fighting release of Diebold vote data files

Another article on Steven Heller's whistleblowing punishment:
[A href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lyn-lear/whistleblower-hero-is-thr_b_16409.html" target=_blank][FONT color=#000000]Whistleblower Hero is Threatened with Prison for Exposing Diebold[/FONT][/A]

[FONT color=#ff0000]More information for your calls, letters and faxes:
[/FONT]


Case Number BA298120
Arraignment date: 4/24/06.
High tech crime division: 213 580 3272

In a nutshell: Heller is a whistleblower. He witnessed a law firm and its client conspiring to lie to the secretary of state. During his employment, they then carried out their plans and actually did lie to the secretary of state as planned. The lie caused voters to be disenfranchised.

The timing of the arrest is suspicious, and it appears to be an attempt to throw cold water on any other whistleblowers.

Blog this, contact the press on this.

Those numbers again:

District Attorney's Office
County of Los Angeles
210 West Temple Street, Suite 18000
Los Angeles, CA 90012-3210

And of course, phone calls:

Telephone (213) 974-3512
Fax (213) 974-1484
TTY (800) 457-7778 (8:30am - 5:00pm M-F)[/DIV]

Witch

I wonder what the other side of the story is?

Adam_Fulford

The other side of the story is one of very well documented corruption.

Adam_Fulford

[SPAN class=updatehead][FONT color=#ff0000][FONT color=#000000]PERMISSION TO REPRINT GRANTED, WITH LINK TO [/FONT][A href="http://www.blackboxvoting.org/" target=_blank]http://www.blackboxvoting.org[/A][/FONT][/SPAN][/DIV][SPAN class=updatehead][FONT face=Verdana color=#ff0000][/FONT][/SPAN] [/DIV][SPAN class=updatehead][FONT face=Verdana color=#ff0000]2-17-06: Election family tree: Who got us into this and how did they meet each other?[/FONT][/SPAN]

As we unravel the family tree responsible for the current elections mess, to our surprise it looks like some of these people are in fact legally related. This article exposes some of the ties, family and otherwise. Let's open the closet and look at some of the underpinnings of today's secret elections:

Two of the most ardent proponents of election secrecy and paperless voting, Los Angeles County Registrar of Elections Conny McCormack and former San Bernardino Registrar Scott Konopasek, appear to be practically brother and sister-in-law, yet we can't find that they have disclosed this.

"I'm too dumb to sleep," wrote Riverside County (Calif.) activist Art Cassel after discovering information hinting at a family relationship. He was joined online in the wee hours of the night last weekend by Bev Harris of Black Box Voting. Soon, Cassel and several BBV researchers were running down more information to learn more about McCormack and Konopasek's relationship.

A recent obituary reported that a family included a son (Austin McCormack, Conny's husband) and Kathryn Konopasek, a daughter. Seeing this Dallas Morning News article, Riverside County activist Art Cassel contacted Black Box Voting. We found that Kathryn "Kate" Konopasek, Conny's sister-in-law, is married to Dean Konopasek. The name Konopasek is quite rare. Cassel found that Scott Konopasek, who now lives in Highland Calif., went to high school in Utah and attended Brigham Young University. Dean Konopasek, who now lives in Alaska, attended Utah State University around the same time. Black Box Voting found that no other family named Konopasek appears to have resided in Utah at any time. Circumstances do support the hypothesis that Dean and Scott are siblings, but we do not have documentation on that yet.

[FONT color=#ff0000]Konopasek's current company: Forefront Election Solutions[/FONT]

[A href="http://www.forefrontelections.com/" target=_blank]http://www.forefrontelections.com/[/A]

When the King County general election in 2004 didn't pass the smell test, Konopasek's Forefront Election Solutions was suggested to "audit" the election. Forefront lost that deal to another enigmatic entity: The Election Center, run by R. Doug Lewis.

While in Sacramento this week, BBV investigator Jim March pulled the corporate documents of Forefront Election Solutions. Currently, Scott Konopasek and his sidekick Stephen Trout are running the company. They launched it in 2004 when Konopasek was fired from his position in San Bernardino County.

Forefront Election Solutions LLC is an elections consulting firm that reportedly was involved in a pitch for a telephone voting system to Los Angeles County Elections. Activists who attended the meeting reported the involvement in Los Angeles County of Konopasek and Forefront to Black Box Voting.

[FONT color=#ff0000]What McCormack and Konopasek have in common[/FONT]

Konopasek and McCormack have raised the ire of voting activists for their outspoken opposition to a paper trail (McCormack, as recently as last June, was advocating against a paper trail in public testimony). Both are over-the-top practitioners of secrecy against the citizenry in elections.

Konopasek referred to Black Box Voting as conducting a "jihad," comparing activists to terrorists at a California public hearing while complaining about a proposed plan to have citizens monitor elections.

In July 2004, Konopasek admitted to BBV investigators that he has sometimes adjusted election data during elections. At the time, BBV investigators were asking if Konopasek knew of any reason that could cause vote totals to go down for a candidate in the middle of a count (which happened to Howard Dean, a candidate in the Democratic presidential primary, in March 2004 in Mohave County, AZ). Konopasek replied that this had happened under his watch in San Bernardino. He claimed that it was due to a need to "massage the data" between the tabulator and the voting machine, adding that the problem had been solved.

This attracted the interest of Adam Cohen, a member of the New York Times editorial board, who -- unbeknownst to Konopasek -- happened to be observing the BBV investigators. He had been quietly sitting on a bench in the San Bernardino elections office while Konopasek made this surprising statement. Cohen immediately got up, made a notation, and asked for details. Cohen had joined Black Box Voting for the visit to San Bernardino, and Konopasek's admission ended up in the New York Times on Aug. 8, 2004.

[FONT color=#ff0000]Paperless pushers: Like one big happy family -- The elections money-go-round[/FONT]

Before heading to San Bernardino, where Konopasek purchased Sequoia paperless touch-screens, Konopasek pushed paperless Sequoia touch-screens into Snohomish County (WA). Snohomish has since dropped the machines.

Prior to Snohomish County, Konopasek was elections supervisor for Salt Lake County (UT), the location that also spawned paperless touch-screen advocate Michael Vu who is now Cuyahoga County (OH) director of elections.

Vu became Salt Lake County elections supervisor not long after Konopasek left. At the age of 28, Vu took over mammoth Cuyahoga County (OH) elections. When visited by BBV investigators Bev Harris and Kathleen Wynne, Vu cited Riverside County (CA) registrar of elections Mischelle Townsend as his "mentor."

Townsend, who resigned suddenly after a series of inquiries by local citizens, is listed on Konopasek's web site for Forefront Election Solutions as one of the consultants.

It was this meeting with Vu that stimulated the formation of the Black Box Voting nonprofit group. Harris and Kathleen Wynne, the activist who first pioneered the voting machine reform issue in Cleveland, had been horrified at Vu's energetic and arrogant promotion of a paperless Diebold touch-screen system. After hearing that he was mentored by Mischelle Townsend (who was at that time under investigation for allowing a Sequoia technician to upload data into the tabulator during a live election), Harris decided that it was time to create a formal group to investigate what is really going on behind the scenes in U.S. elections. Harris and Wynne ditched a luncheon meeting in Cleveland to discuss the idea and six weeks later, Black Box Voting, Inc. was born.

Back to the paperless pitch people: Stephen Trout, who was Konopasek's sidekick in San Bernardino, had been with former Calif. Secretary of State Bill Jones. After his tenure as Secretary of State, Jones went on to pitch Sequoia touch-screens as a "consultant" for Sequoia. And if that wasn't fishy enough, when anti-paperless touch-screen Secretary of State Kevin Shelley took over in California, Trout left to help Konopasek get Sequoia paperless touch-screens into San Bernardino County.

McCormack behaves as if Diebold is family as well. At one time, she went on a personal vacation with then-Diebold salesperson Deborah Seiler. At the California VSPP meetings, in a room filled with people, McCormack typically sits with Diebold. McCormack's picture has been on the Diebold Web site advertising its products.

McCormack's commitment to nontransparent elections was exposed when her staff [A href="http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/1954/13095.html" target=_blank]pulled a bait and switch[/A] on observers in November 2005, telling reporters and citizens that optical scan machines were the tallying machines. When asked about this by Harris, McCormack's staff admitted that tallying is done in another location, off limits and not viewable by the public. Harris questioned McCormack about this violation of California law. McCormack refused to allow Harris (or any other member of the public) to observe the tallying and instead called in five members of the Los Angeles County sheriff's department to guard Harris and others, lest the citizenry make a break for it to attempt to watch any vote tallying.

In July 2005, BBV's Jim March was [A href="http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/1954/8556.html" target=_blank]arrested in San Diego County[/A] when he tried to watch the vote-counting.

[FONT color=#ff0000]It's time for full disclosure[/FONT]

Whether or not they like secrecy, Konopasek and McCormack need to disclose any family relationship. If they are brother and sister-in-law, this is clearly relevant to any recommendations, endorsements, special access, and business dealings. It would be likely that they would have met at their weddings, perhaps decades ago, and any interfacing of their public elections work should be examined.

Conny Drake McCormack married Austin McCormack in Dallas, Texas. She had been in charge of jury pools, was then moved up to Supervisor of Elections in Dallas County, where she immediately got into hot water for allegedly disenfranchising minority voters by shorting them on ballots. BBV investigator Kathleen Wynne has obtained the court documents on that investigation, and she will be posting those soon.

McCormack was subjected to a two-year investigation by the Texas attorney general's office for alleged election-rigging, in connection with the 1985 election of Dallas Mayor Starke Taylor (an interesting character in his own right; to finance development of property he was hoping to develop, pending a land use decision by city officials -- he was one of the officials -- he took out a loan with a savings and loan association that he also owned. He defaulted on his loan and the S&L went out of business. Then he sued the S&L for making bad loans.)

The investigation in McCormack's alleged rigging of Starke Taylor's election was eventually dropped, after McCormack left the state of Texas to take a position in San Diego County, replacing Ray Ortiz. Together, MCormack and Ortiz had been leading a national association of elections officials when Ortiz was indicted on several counts of fraud. McCormack subsequently took Ortiz's position in San Diego. Ortiz went to work for a voting machine vendor.

[FONT color=#ff0000]Time for Southern Calif. citizens to get to work on this[/FONT]

Let us know if you'd like guidance on what records to seek. More information needs to be obtained about why Konopasek was fired, how he was selected and hired in the first place, and what Forefront Election Solutions is doing.

If Konopasek's firm, Forefront, is doing business with Los Angeles County, it needs to be determined how he gained access to Los Angeles County for the telephone voting sales pitch. Who paid for his "consulting" services? Black Box Voting is conducting public records requests to learn whether McCormack has hired Forefront for anything, and if so, if she disclosed any family relationship with Konopasek. We are also seeking records as to whether Konopasek listed McCormack as a reference, or obtained recommendations from her, in any of his work with either San Bernardino or other counties.

RESEARCH WAS CONTRIBUTED FOR THIS ARTICLE BY ART CASSEL, BEV HARRIS, KATHLEEN WYNNE, JIM MARCH AND CATHERINE ANSBRO.

IF YOU BELIEVE CITIZEN OVERSIGHT OF ELECTIONS IS IMPORTANT, PLEASE JOIN THE 2006 ELECTION CLEANUP CREW. WORK STARTS NOW. WE WILL PROVIDE ONE ON ONE CONSULTING TO HELP YOU UNCOVER WHAT'S GOING ON IN ELECTIONS NEAR YOU. E-MAIL [email protected]. (Allow a few days for a response, due to our heavy travel schedules.)

PERMISSION TO REPRINT GRANTED, WITH LINK TO [A href="http://www.blackboxvoting.org/" target=_blank]http://www.blackboxvoting.org[/A][!--/Text--][/DIV]

Witch

Yes I understand your side of the story Adam. What I was wondering about is the other side.

Not to suggest that you're being untruthful, but this isn't exactly an unbiased report. Your side is that the company is the evil empire, the companies side is that they've been misrepresented. As usual it's likely that the truth lies somewhere in between.

So I guess my question should have been, does anyone know of any reports on this story from unbiased sources?

TehBorken

I've read a bit about this and it sure seems to me there was a huge amount of vote fraud. I usually turn a pretty sceptical eye towards this stuff, but the evidence is overwhelming that there was indeed a lot of tampering, pre-loading of votes, and a lot of "over-voting". Diebold won't show people the source code for the voting program, which in my view ought to be available to every voter. By law it ought to be Open Source. Too much funny business with Diebold, you could write a dozen books and barely scratch the surface.


The real trouble with reality is that there's no background music.

Adam_Fulford

Sometimes the truth doesn't lie in the middle, Witch.

There was a [A href="http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00001838.htm"][FONT color=#0000ff]Dept. of Homeland Security warning[/FONT][/A][FONT color=#0000ff] [/FONT]that Diebold  tabulator software is hackable. A non-partisan [A href="http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00001940.htm"][FONT color=#0000ff]GAO report confirming[/FONT][/A][FONT color=#0000ff] [/FONT]the failures and loss of ballots via electronic voting was published.  A recent[FONT color=#0000ff] [/FONT][A href="http://www.votetrustusa.org/pdfs/California_Folder/DieboldReport.pdf"][FONT color=#0000ff][FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffff00" color=#000000]independent [/FONT]analysis [PDF][/FONT][/A][FONT color=#0000ff] [/FONT]commissioned by the Secretary of State of California warns about the hackable "interpeted code" used in Diebold voting machines, despite a ban on such code by the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA) guidelines.  [FONT color=#0000ff]CAN'T GET MORE MAINSTREAM THAN THAT, Witch.[/FONT]

In other words Diebold has broken the law and the integrity of American elections is as threatened by the complicity of corrupt public officials, yet the only person facing a lawsuit and possible jail-time is a whistle-blower who, at great personal sacrifice, acted in the interest of the American public.

Witch

None of the sources in your post could even remotely be considered unbiased Adam.

Which is precisely what I was referring to. You have an opinion, and you choose sources that agree with you. I have yet to form an informed opinion, although I have suspicions, and so I need to see reports from some unbiased sources to make sure I'm forming my opinion fairly.

What you've given just doesn't count as unbiased. Occam's Razor tells us that the truth is probably somewhere between your position and The other side.

Adam_Fulford

The bipartisan GAO (General Accounting Office) couldn't "even remotely be considered unbiased"??  [A href="http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d05956.pdf"]http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d05956.pdf[/A]  How about laws against the kind of hackable "interpeted code" used in Diebold voting machines, stated in the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA) guidelines -- they couldn't "remotely be considered unbiased"?? Nor could an independent report commissioned by the Secretary of State of California [FONT color=#0000ff][A href="http://www.votetrustusa.org/pdfs/California_Folder/DieboldReport.pdf"]http://www.votetrustusa.org/pdfs/California_Folder/DieboldReport.pdf[/A][/FONT][FONT color=#000000]  written with the assistance of Chris Karlof and Naveen Sastry of the University of California "even remotely be considered unbiased"??  [/FONT][/DIV]

Witch

[BLOCKQUOTE dir=ltr style="MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"]Adam_Fulford wrote:


The bipartisan GAO (General Accounting Office) couldn't "even remotely be considered unbiased"??  [A href="http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d05956.pdf"]http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d05956.pdf[/A]  [/DIV][/BLOCKQUOTE] In the post I was referring to, you didn't reference this document, you referenced some guys blog who obviously has an axe to grind. In addition, this document is in no way saying what your original post in this thread says, so it's not really a help to you.

[BLOCKQUOTE dir=ltr style="MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"]How about laws against the kind of hackable "interpeted code" used in Diebold voting machines, stated in the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA) guidelines -- they couldn't "remotely be considered unbiased"?? [/DIV][/BLOCKQUOTE] That's assuming that the Diebold machines actually contravene those guidlines. So far you havn't given any independant sources that show this is the case. Again you've given us the claims of some very biased sources that may or may not be misrepresenting the actual facts.

[BLOCKQUOTE dir=ltr style="MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"]Nor could an independent report commissioned by the Secretary of State of California [FONT color=#0000ff][A href="http://www.votetrustusa.org/pdfs/California_Folder/DieboldReport.pdf"]http://www.votetrustusa.org/pdfs/California_Folder/DieboldReport.pdf[/A][/FONT][FONT color=#000000]  written with the assistance of Chris Karlof and Naveen Sastry of the University of California "even remotely be considered unbiased"??  [/FONT][/DIV][/BLOCKQUOTE]
Is that actually the transcript of said report? Hard to say. Anyone can type up a "report", put a fancy sounding title on it and pdf it. The report isn't signed, it bears no seal, and there's no independant corroboration that it is genuine. You've already accused one organisation of lying, who's to say this votetrustusa.org is honest? I'm not willing to take your word for it, sorry.

As I've said before, I'm suspicious of the voting machines, but I see no need to take the word of one very biased side over the word of the other very biased side. That is why I would like to see info from unbiased sources, which you have certqainly not yet given.

Adam_Fulford

[DIV class=document]February 22, 2006

The Honorable Bruce McPherson
Secretary of State
1500 11th Street
Sacramento, CA 95814

Dear Secretary McPherson:

I strongly urge you to reverse your February 17th decision to re-certify Diebold's voting machines for use in California. Your decision contradicts your earlier commitment not to review Diebold's re-certification request until it had been approved by the federal Independent Testing Authorities (ITA) and your commitment not to certify any system that doesn't comply with all standards established by the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA). Furthermore, your decision violates state law. While your decision may be good for Diebold and its shareholders, it is not in the best interests of California's voters or our democracy.

Federal ITA and HAVA Issues

On December 20, 2005, you announced that you would not consider reviewing the Diebold systems until the ITA had acted. Specifically, you stated, "During a thorough review of the application for the Diebold system currently pending certification, we have determined that there is sufficient cause for additional federal evaluation. I have consistently stated that I will not certify any system for use in California unless it meets the most stringent voting system requirements." Attached to your statement was a letter from the chief of your Elections Division to Diebold, written presumably at your direction, stating, "We require this additional review before proceeding with further consideration of your application for certification in California. Once we have received a report from the federal ITA adequately analyzing this source code, in addition to the technical and operational specifications relating to the memory card and interpreter, we will expeditiously proceed with our comprehensive review of your application." The ITA has yet to conclude its review of the Diebold memory cards, yet you have re-certified the machines in direct contradiction of your December 20, 2005, commitment to the voters.

On August 3, 2005, you announced that "[a]ll systems certified by the Secretary of State's Office shall comply with the standards and requirements of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 (HAVA) [Public Law 107-22, 106th Congress], including all requirements, standards and regulations promulgated pursuant to authority derived from HAVA, as well as complying with all other applicable requirements and standards explicit in federal and state laws, and any requirements, standards and regulations deriving authority from federal and state laws." As you know, the 2002 Voting System Standards adopted by the Federal Election Commission (FEC) were adopted by the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) as the first set of guidelines adopted under HAVA. Those guidelines recommend that voting machines not be certified for use if they contain interpreted code. The Diebold machines that you re-certified on February 17 contain interpreted code, which is in direct violation of your August 3, 2005, commitment to follow the higher standards set forth by the EAC and the FEC.

Violations of California Law

Your decision to re-certify Diebold's machines violates California Elections Code Section 19250(a), which precludes the Secretary of State from approving the use of any direct recording electronic (DRE) voting system unless it has received federal qualification. You sent the memory cards back to the Independent Testing Authorities (ITA) in December 2005 because, as you noted in the letter from the chief of your Elections Division to Diebold, ". . . this component was not subjected to federal source code review and evaluation by the Independent Testing Authorities (ITA) who examined your system for federal qualification. It is the Secretary of State's position that the source code for the AccuBasic code on these cards, as well as for the AccuBasic interpreter that interprets this code, should have been federally reviewed." If it was your position on December 20, 2005, that certain components of the system had never been federally reviewed, how could you lawfully certify a system on February 17 under Elections Code Section 19250(a) that contains these uncertified components?

Your decision to re-certify Diebold's machines also violates Elections Code Section 19251(a). As you know, as of January 1, 2006, all DRE voting systems have to come with an accessible voter verified paper audit trail (AVVPAT). The AVVPAT must be "provided or conveyed to voters via both a visual and a nonvisual method, such as through an audio component." The Diebold TSx doesn't comply with this provision of the law. Instead, it provides an audio read-back of how the voter's ballot was recorded electronically, not how it was captured on the AVVPAT, which makes the AVVPAT on the Diebold DRE useless for blind or visually-impaired voters. Given that fact, it appears Diebold's voting systems don't comply with Elections Code Section 19251(a) and therefore can't lawfully be certified for use in California.

Required Public Process Not Completed

Finally, there is a significant legal issue that needs to be addressed regarding the lack of public notice and absence of a public hearing that should have preceded your decision to re-certify the Diebold machines. Although the report is dated February 14, 2006, the fact is this report wasn't released publicly until after you issued your decision to re-certify the Diebold machines on February 17. The argument that the November 21, 2005, hearing you held on Diebold obviates the need for a new hearing under Elections Code Section 19204 doesn't suffice, because your decision to re-certify Diebold's machines was based solely on a report that wasn't available, completed, or even envisioned at the time of the November 21, 2005, hearing. To hold a public hearing without providing the public with the information on which you based your decision to re-certify the Diebold machines only serves to undermine the public hearing requirement of the law.

For all of these reasons, I call on you to restore transparency to the voting machine certification process, which begins by reversing your decision to re-certify Diebold's machines for use in California.

Sincerely,

Debra Bowen, Chairwoman
Senate Elections, Reapportionment & Constitutional Amendments Committee[/DIV]

Witch

Interesting letter. Did Debra Bowen write it?

And how does this letter show that a whistleblower is being bullied?

Adam_Fulford


Adam_Fulford

The LA District Attorney is going after Stephen Heller, who was the whistleblower who presented the evidence that allowed California to succesfully sue Diebold, yet isn't going after Diebold that knowingly broke California law and compromised the integrity of American democracy.  Witch, you decide.

Adam_Fulford

[FONT size=4][SPAN id=article_body_title]Diebold whistle blower faces theft charges [/SPAN]

The price for saving democracy[/FONT]
By [A id=article_body_lnkEmailForm href="jvascript:__doPostBack('article_body$lnkEmailForm','')"]Nick Farrell[/A][A id=article_body_authormail title="email the author" href="http://www.theinquirer.net/page_controls/[email protected]"][/A]: [SPAN id=article_body_submitted]Tuesday 28 February 2006, 08:02[/SPAN]

[FONT size=2][SPAN][FONT size=3]A MAN who leaked documents that proved that Diebold was using dodgy machines to run an election, now faces three charges of stealing computer data, commercial burglary and receiving stolen property. [/FONT]

[FONT size=3]Stephen Heller has pleased not guilty to the charge and his brief will say that anyone who saw those documents could have reasonably believed that thousands of voters were going to be potentially disenfranchised in upcoming elections.[/FONT]

[FONT size=3]Heller was a contractor working as a processor at the legal firm of Jones Day, the Oakland Tribune claimed. He was given a memo to type from Jones Day attorney to another regarding allegations by activists that Diebold had used uncertified voting systems in Alameda County elections beginning in 2002. [/FONT][FONT size=3]The memo said that using uncertified voting systems violated California election law and that if Diebold had employed an uncertified system, Alameda County could sue. [/FONT][FONT size=3]A subsequent report by the office of the Secretary of State found that Diebold had marketed and sold its systems before gaining federal qualification and had installed uncertified software on election machines in 17 counties. [/FONT][FONT size=3]The Oakland Tribune published the legal memos on its website in April 2004 and police decided Heller was the source. By a strange quirk in California law, a whistle blower is protected from action from his employer, but can still have the book thrown at him by the officers of the law. [/FONT][FONT size=3]If convicted on all three charges Heller could face three years and eight months in state prison. More at the LA Times, [/FONT][A href="http://www.latimes.com/news/local/politics/socal/la-me-diebold22feb22,0,33600.story?coll=la-news-politics-local" target=blank][FONT size=3]here[/FONT][/A][FONT size=3]. µ[/FONT]

[/SPAN][/FONT]

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