West Haven Complaint 2

8/9/2019 West Haven Complaint 2

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RECEIVEDSTATE ELECTIONSSTATE OF CONNECTICUTSTATE ELECTIONS ENFORCEMENT C O M M 4 ~ ~ ~ 1 020 Trinity Street Hartford, Connecticut 06106--1628

E N F O R C E M E j ~ i l:OMMISSIONs:B

Affidavit ofComplaint C8MPlAJIltlt. 1O 0. 4 0I, Debo(CLb e / ~ e 16h, am a resident of

PrintName of Complain &85 KpJs f fie A l l e n ~Print Complainant's S eetAddressTown/City of J,0 es t t-f-c!.. Lh::'.Jl

Print Town orCity Name , State of C()r7t11 (' 1(' ut Ofo S I ~ ;Print State & Zip Codeand my Telephone Number is ,;2.C):3 ... '/3'1- 815'T . I hereby allege and assert that

Print Phone Number

the election laws of the State of Connecticut have been violated in the following manner,

place and time, as specified below:S-e. t:. .)


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March 7,2010

To whom it may concern;

Please accept the following complaint that is in regard to the recanvass of votes in West HavenCT.The following facts have been gathered concerning the recanvass ofvotes in Districts 1,2,3,8,10.The original recanvass took place on March 4,2010.At the opening of the recanvass it was brought to the attention of the Head Moderator RobertSymmes that the people who were brought in to participate in the recanvass were notrepresentative of anyone on the Row B slate. Registrar ofVoters Michelle Hufcut argued thatthey did not have to be. Symmes at that point in time went to obtain a book and read from it thatthere will be equal representation so that the workers can be paired up to recount the ballots.Because it was completely one-sided Mr. Symmes allowed those in the room to stand closeenough to watch the proceedings. No one was allowed to touch the ballots or speak to theworkers.The re canvass began and Districts 1,2, and 10 were completed and although votes were shiftedthere was no change as to who had originally won..The recanvass in those three districts weredetermined to be conclusive. Mr. Symmes identified the results as final.Districts 3 & 8 continued to complete their recanvass. The results for District 8 were finally calledout by Head Moderator Robert Symmes. He concluded that there was no change that affected theoutcome of the Primary, therefore district 8 was concluded. Immediately it was brought to hisattention that in fact there was a change in the original results. A candidate onRow A who hadoriginally won (Edward O'Brien) had fewer votes than a candidate on Row B (John Roper) whohad lost originally by four votes. At that point there was mass confusion. City Clerk DeborahCollins ran to the front of the room and said something to Symmes and Registrar ofVotersMichelle Hufcut. Symmes then declared that Hufcut had instructed him to impound the ballots forDistrict 8. Subsequently all counting in District 3 was halted. It was determined that the recanvasswould resume on Saturday march 6, 2010 at lOam.At that time Mr. Charles Marino asked that the ballots be sealed in a ballot bag and the sealnumber be placed on the ballot bag in front of those in the room. Since the ballots had alreadybeen removed from the room we were the recanvass took place, Michelle had to go to retrieve


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District 3 and 8. Ms Hufcut came back after a few minutes with the boxes that still had the ballotspreviously run through them inside. She removed the ballots stating they were district 8 ballotsand placed them into a ballot bag . She included the manilla envelope marked 73 that held thehand counted ballots fromDistrict 8 into the bag. She placed seal number 0600776 on the bag.District three was also sealed with seal number 0600781.At that point everyone left the room. Thebags that were presumed to be Districts 1,2, and 10 were left unsealed because the recanvass wasdetermined to be conclusive.

SATURDAYMARCH 6,2010 10 amAt the start of the recanvass ofboth District 3 and 8 the black boxes, tabulators and two sealedbags were brought into the room. At that time instructions were given as to how the recanvasswould proceed.. Upon opening the ballot bag for district 8 with seal number 0600776, (the samenumber recorded on Thursday March 4th at the close of the recanvass) it was determined that thebag did not contain the ballots for District 8. The ballots found in the sealed bag were in factDistrict 1 ballots. At that point Mr. CharlesMarino objected to them proceeding any furthersaying the ballots he was told got sealed on Thursday were not in the sealed bag.He continuedthat at this point he was not aware of the location of the District 8 ballots and that they werenever sealed in our presence. Mr. Marino said he was protesting the validity of the recanvass asthe ballots may be corrupt. He was told to leave. He said he would not and he was threatenedwith a call to the police. Mr. Marino stated please call as I want this all on record. The policecame. In the mean time Ms. Hufcut went and retrieved the other three ballot bags. Two ofwhichwere not sealed and one that was. That seal number had never been seen by anyone who waspresent. The seal was cut and District 8 ballots removed from ballot bag 4B.At this point the counting begins and the counters in District 8 Chris Prue, and Patricia Horvathare checking the ballots for any questionable ballots. After a few minutes Ms. Horvath raises herhands over her head and calls out I'm stopping here. Mr. Symmes questioned her and shereported that there were district 10 ballots mixed in with the district 8 ballots. We question howthese ballots got mixed in since they were run through the tabulator and were hand countedwithout any being found. The hand counted envelope was sealed with District 1 on Thursdayevening, and the other 8th district ballots ran through the tabulator. So our question is unlesssomeone had gone through the 8th district ballots (which were unsealed) how and when diddistrict 10 ballots get into the bag?

At that point the recanvass once again was stopped. According to MS. Hufcut she had placed acall to the Secretary of State but had not gotten a response. It was then that everything was onceagain sealed including the vault they were stored in. The vault seal was seal number 0344381.When asked when the recanvass procedure would reconvene Ms. Hufcut stated she would await aruling from the State.It is believed that the integrity of the election process has been tainted, breached and found to beabsent. Ballots from District 8 were not secured at the end of the evening on March 4,2010 as we


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were lead to believe. Therefore tampering of the ballots is a distinct possibility.

Sincerely, .

(dV7J..- ~ ~ . ~ ~


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RECEr,r'r ' STATE ELf

STATE OF CONNECTICUTSTATE ELECTIONS ENFORCEMENT C O M M ~ 8 A 2 0 1 U20 Trinity Street Hartford, Connecticut 06106-1628 COMMISE N F O H ~ l : M E N T .. .. SION

Affidavit of Complaint, am a resident of fl5 U ~ / ' L!4"v.,v 5/Print Complainant's Street Address

Town/City of U ~ IdtvC,.dPrint Town or City Name ,State of tlz; L:JkO?Print State& ZipCodeand my Telephone Number is j .p/" 9'52 - / ~ . I hereby allege and assert that

Print Phone Number

the election laws of the State ofConnecticut have been violated in the following manner,place and time, as specified below:

(Use attached page(s) ifnecessary)I SOLEMNLY SWEAR (ORAFFIRM) THAT THE ABOVE STATEMENT IS TRUEAND COMPLETE TO THE BESTOFMY KNOWLEDGE AND BELIEF.DatedthisLdayofAdd"' ,f , 2 0 ~ a t k ~ . "/2,...,._ 1:i1'-t. ~ ' t . - r / C''' /JP Y'f"f

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RECEIVEDSTATE OF CONNECTICUT STATEELECTIONSSTATE ELECTIONS ENFORCEMENT C O M M J ; S N ~ W 01020 Trinity Street Hartford, Connecticut 06106-162li"J 2

iNfORCEMENT CQMMISSION

Affidavit ofComplaintI, t ! k t l e ~ 1tkt:'40Print Name ofComplainant , am a resident of 2! C:i1'1U4eLu 5"r ;Print Complainant's Street AddressTown/City of V B T /z (dvEtUPrint Town orCity Name , State of I!L t7k5/.Print State & ZipCodeand my Telephone Number is ;2171 ' - " ' 7 - / - . I hereby allege and assert that

Print Phone Number

the election laws of the State ofConnecticut have been violated in the following manner,place and time, as specified below:

(Use attached page(s) if necessary)I SOLEMNLY SWEAR (OR AFFIRM) THAT THE ABOVE STATEMENT IS TRUEAND COMPLETE TO THE BEST OF MY KNOWLEDGE AND BELIEF.Dated thisLday of Il7l1lull ,20% at # ' ~ L / 2 . .... _S i g n e d ~ ~ ~

OathAdministered By:itle .Note: This oath may be administered by anyone authorized by Section 1-24 ofthe Connecticut General Statutes, which includes notaries public; justices of the.peace, town clerks and assistant town clerks, judges and clerks of any court, andattorneys who are Commissioners of the Superior Court of Connecticut.


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1Affidavit of events I witnessed at the recounts held on

March 6, 2010 in City Hall West Haven of the March 4th 2010 recanvass forDemocratic Town Committee Seats in West Haven CT.

For Districts 3 and 8

As a result of a discrepancy that the Head Moderator (Robert Symmes) said he noticed indistrict 3 and district 8 at the March 4th recount. These ballots were placed in ballottransfer bags under seal.District 3 - Seal # 0600781 / 3rd district - 22 hand countDistrict 8 - Seal # 0600776 / 8th district - 73 hand countThen these bags and the tabulators were placed into the vault at the end of the hallway.Head Moderator announced that the recount of 3rd and 8th districts would be on SaturdayMorning at lOam.

Saturday 9am Debbie Evangalista and I arrived early and took seats in Room B in thebasement. During the time from 9am to lOam the people hired to do the recount began toarrive. The head moderator broke them into teams. At this point it was noted that one ofthe B line counters had not arrived. Ms. Hufcutt Hufcutt, Registrar of Voters, hiredPatricia Horvath to take his place. One team for the 3rd district, one team for the 8thdistrict and one team for the absentee ballots.After swearing in all participants and announcing the bag seals, they commenced to openthe bags.Ballot bag with seal number 0600781 contained the ballots for the 3rd district poll. Thecounters proceeded to follow instructions and began to sort through the ballots. Theywere instructed to put to one side those ballots they felt would not be read completely bythe tabulator.Then Ms. Hufcutt moved to open the 8th district bag. The bag seal was announced as0600776 as it was when the bag was filled with ballots on Thursday March 4th. At thattime I was told that the ballots placed in the bag were 8th district ballots. Ballots underseal, locked in the vault.


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2Ms. Hufcutt cut the seal and a large manila envelope was removed from the bag. Thisenvelope had a hand written "73" on it that indicated that it contained the hand countedballots from the March 4th recount.As Mr. Symmes was opening this envelope and sorting the contents, Mr. Chris Prue (acounter), turned to Mr. Symmes and said "these are 151 district ballots". At that point Iraised my voice and interrupted the activity. Mr. Symmes cautioned me to be quiet or hewould have me removed. I told him that I would not be quiet and I wanted to knowwhere the 8th district ballots are? He said that if I didn' t stop he would call the police. Isaid call the police - he then dismissed me from the room - I declined to leave. Ms.Hufcutt sent someone to call the police.While waiting for the police I asked Mr. Nick Demaio ifthe ballots in front of him are 3rddistrict ballots. Nick said they were 3rd district ballots. Mr. Symmes ordered him not totalk to me. I told Mr. Symmes that Nick represents me and "you" hired him so I can talkto him. Then silence.At this point Ms. Hufcutt said she would go and get the ballots for the 8th district. Whenshe returned she had 3 bags in hand; 2 without any seals and one bag with a seal on it. Iapproached the table to see the bags more closely and Ms. Hufcutt told me to stand back.I continued to get close enough to red the seal on a bag identified as bag 4B - seal0600713. This was the first time I saw this seal. Ms. Hufcutt cut the seal and thecontents of the bag were the 8th district ballots.The police arrived and first heard from Ms. Hufcutt and Mr. Symmes, then they took mystatement and that of others in the room.The police sergeant asked Ms. Hufcutt for the law that allowed them to eject me from theroom. She referred him to Mr. Symmes who presented several statutes to the officer.None of the statutes presented to the officer empowered Mr. Symmes or Ms. Hufcutt toremove anyone from these proceedings. At this point the sergeant stated he would leavean officer behind and I should be allowed to return to the recount.

(During a conversation with Judge Levitt, he told me that I had done nothing wrong, Ihad simply asked a question.)


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3I returned to my seat and Mr. Symmes ordered the count to proceed. As it wasprogressing the team handling the 3rd district ballots had sorted and separated as perinstructions and counted 410 ballots. Five of which they felt needed to be hand counted.I learned this by watching and listening to them work.However, the tearn handling the 8th district ballots carne to a point where Ms. PatriciaHorvath announced that she had just uncovered a 10 th district ballot in the 8th districtballot bundle and refused to go any further.Mr. Symmes then declared a halt to the process. Mr. Symmes declared that he wanted toget in touch with the Secretary of State's office.Some time passed and it was reported to us that Ms. Hufcutt was unsuccessful withmaking contact with the Secretary of State or anyone from her office. That being thecase, all ballots and tabulators were to be re-sealed and returned to the vault.Candidates from the 3rd district asked Mr. Symmes "why can't you complete the 3rddistrict i t' s here and there isn 't any problem with it". To which Mr. Symmes said hewould not proceed until he got direction from the Secretary of State's office. At thispoint Mr. Symmes secured the ballots.Ballot bag 3A seal for District 3 is 0600720Ballot bag 4B seal for District 8 is 0344400Ballot bag 6B seal for Absentee ballots is 0344385He then opened the floor for questions.Question:I asked: "at the beginning of this process Bob, you said that the absentee ballots would becounted by hand as opposed to being run through the tabulator. Why is that?"Answer:He replied "because we don't have a chip for the absentee ballots".I then remarked "so you don't have sufficient electronic". There were no other questionsthat I recalled at this time.Mr. Symmes, Ms. Hufcutt and Ms. Walters moved the equipment back to the vault. Thevault was locked and placed under seal # 0344381.


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4This to the best of my recollection are the events that occurred the morning of March 6,2010 at the second attempted recount for the 3rd and 8th districts at city hall.

Respectfully Submitted

Charles Marino93 East Brown StreetWest Haven CT 06516Phone: 203-937-1684


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Documents

West Haven Complaint 2