Damages and Penalties to 'World's Largest' Voting Systems Provider 'Could Reach into Millions of Dollars'
New Case Follows Yesterday's $15 Million Suit Against ES by CA SoS Bowen...
Blogged by Brad from St. Louis, MO...
"San Francisco's experience with ES raises extremely troubling questions, not simply about the integrity of this company's technology, but about the
integrity of this company itself," San Francisco's City Attorney Dennis Herrera said today in announcing his new lawsuit
against Elections Systems & Software, Inc. (ES).
"There can be no more important duty in a representative democracy than to conduct elections, and it is a travesty to
see that duty so flagrantly undermined by the fraudulent conduct of an election systems vendor," he added.
Well, no kidding! To quote from It's a Wonderful Life, "'Bout time one of you lunkheads said it!"
The suit filed today against ES, the "world's largest", comes on the heels of yesterday's announcement that California Secretary of State Debra Bowen was filing her own suit, to the tune of some $15 million, against the
company for their illegal and undeclared use of uncertified touch-screen voting systems in several counties across the
state, as well as their having lied about it to the state.
The Fog City Journal's coverage of the SF lawsuit begins this way...
City Attorney Dennis Herrera filed suit against the City's voting systems vendor today, charging Omaha, Neb.-based
Election Systems & Software, Inc. with a panoply of wrongdoing that includes fraud, breach of contract, negligent misrepresentation and
multiple violations of California's Elections Code, False Claims Act and Unfair Competition Law. In a 23-page civil
complaint filed in San Francisco Superior Court this morning, Herrera detailed a months-long pattern of
misrepresentations and voting system problems by ES that caused California Secretary of State Debra Bowen to impose stringent conditions on the City's use of the company's
voting machines to conduct its municipal election earlier this month. Because of those restrictions, San Francisco
election officials were forced to tabulate ballots centrally; to remake thousands of ballots by hand; and to borrow
equipment from another county.
We've been calling for some time for states and counties to hold the voting machine companies accountable for their
horrendous, out and out fraudulent business practices. Looks like the floodgates may finally be starting to open.
So who's next? Make no mistake, there will be more. Perhaps many. Stay tuned...
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