Citizen oversight and access to information is our best hope for long term integrity in elections. We proved our case about voting machines -- and Russell Simons/Simon Ardizzone memorialized that in "Hacking Democracy." Now let's walk the walk with citizen oversight. Every lead story at Black Box Voting for the rest of the year will feature CITIZENS on the front lines doing election oversight.

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HERE'S AN IMPORTANT STORY ABOUT A CITIZEN YOU HAVEN'T HEARD ABOUT: KATHY IN KENTUCKY -- and what can be done to help her

 REPORT FROM THE FRONT LINES: Kathy Greenwell - Bullitt County, Kentucky

Elections give you: The judge, the prosecutor and the sheriff

"Watch your back," warned the voice on the phone. "You know what can happen around here," said another man, paying a visit to her workplace. "I don't want to read about them finding you in a ditch."

For some people, elections are serious business. For some citizens, democratic elections are a serious matter too. Ever since Nov. 2006, Kentucky's Kathy Greenwell has been trying to verify the election results, and like all citizens, she should have that right. "I know I sound like a hillbilly," she says in a Bullitt County drawl. "I got a deep voice. I might sound country, but that don't mean they shouldn't pay attention to what I got to say."

Kathy took the time to add up all the numbers coming out of Bullitt County on Election Night during the 2006 general election. They made no sense. Nothing added up, and the story kept changing about what was going on. What she found illustrates the broken connection between elections and the citizenry. Kathy had a good reason to be interested: Her husband Dave, now a police lieutenant for the town of Pioneer Village, was running for Bullitt County Sheriff. Sheriff races are always of great interest to the locals, and are a traditional target for election fraud. The sheriff controls contraband, like guns and drugs.

In Nov. 2006, it wasn't just the sheriff race that was contentious. Bullitt County had at least two tight house races. (1) A mayoral candidate (Sherman Tinnell) and a candidate for sheriff (Donnie Tinnell) were members of the same family. Both won. As is customary in Bullitt County, a candidate for clerk would later take custody over the audit records for his own election. ELECTIONS ARE ABOUT A LOT MORE THAN PRESIDENTS Kathy's husband, Dave Greenwell was running against Donnie Tinnell. He'd made a campaign promise to reopen a botched murder investigation.

All you do is search for "Bullitt County" and "sheriff" and a lot more information shows up on that controversy: In 1999, Dave Greenwell was the first deputy on the scene of the heartbreaking abduction of a teenage girl. Seventeen-year-old Jessica Dishon's parents had come home to find her car in the driveway, with her keys, purse, and cell phone still sitting in the car, along with one shoe. Jessica was nowhere to be found. Alarmed, Jessica's parents called the sheriff's office. Then-deputy Greenwell arrived, took photos, and sized up the situation as a possible abduction. Twice, Greenwell requested an investigator; both times the assigned official refused to come.(2)

This story illustrates that elections are absolutely NOT just about presidencies. Elections ultimately govern public safety. And as you'll soon see, Kathy Greenwell's research into this election turned up elections anomalies in nearly all the races in Bullitt County's 2006 general election. In Bullitt County, Kentucky the sheriff, the prosecutor and the judge all hold elected positions. Neither the sheriff nor the prosecutor did much to secure the Dishon crime scene. Greenwell called in the investigators; none came; yellow crime scene tape was reportedly put around the neighbor's car instead of Jessica's.

During the 72 hours that the investigator was refusing to come to the scene, the forensic evidence was contaminated. At one point a reporter had sat in the front of the car to shoot a newscast. Onlookers touched the car. Greenwell had taken several photographs, which he submitted into evidence. Those photos disappeared, along with the notes written by another investigator (Jim Adams).(2) Seventeen days after Jessica's abduction, her body was found beaten and apparently strangled in a location known as the Salt River Bottoms.(3) Not long afterward, that area was bulldozed and cleaned up. Apparently someone decided this was a good time to begin excavation for a new bridge. Satellite photo - Greenwell Ford Road Bridge: http://www.bbvdocs.org/KY/bridge.jpg

Three separate witnesses testified that they had seen Jessica Dishon with two young men in a black Camaro.(4) The young men were identified as "persons of interest" but were never charged. The items in the Camaro were never sent to the crime lab for testing. One of the young men has since died in a car accident.(5) Instead, a man named "Bucky" Brooks whose IQ hovers around 70 was accused of the crime. During the year Bucky Brooks was held in prison, Dave Greenwell's crime scene photos disappeared, a videotaped statement by a witness was lost, and the original notes by investigator Jim Adams vanished.(2)

The case against Bucky Brooks was dismissed after some illegal testimony was entered into the record.(4) Crime investigations are supervised by elected officials. Construction projects are authorized by elected officials. The prosecutor holds an elected position. Photo of the courthouse where votes are counted in Bullitt count elections - http://www.bbvdocs.org/KY/bullit-elections.jpg As the elections approached, Kathy's husband Dave decided Bullitt County might benefit from a different approach to law enforcement.

He announced his intention to run for sheriff. He was fired the same day he announced it. Greenwell sued for wrongful termination, on the grounds that any citizen has the right to run for office without getting fired; the sheriff at the time, Paul Parsley, testified that he was not about to pay a deputy who was running against him for office. The judge dismissed the case, saying there was no indication Greenwell had been fired for political reasons.(5) With the Dishon murder sitting in the cold case files, Greenwell made a campaign promise to reopen the case, and also to put the brakes on the Bullitt County habit of staffing itself with family members of elected officials.

On Nov. 7, 2006, in a Bullitt County election that the press characterized as "mass confusion," Greenwell was defeated by Donnie Tinnell. (7) Maybe the citizens of Bullitt County voted Donnie Tinnell into the sheriff's office. Maybe Sherman Tinnell was voted in as Shepherdsville mayor as well. What we do know for sure is that assorted family members of various players in the Bullitt County dramas have been hired and are sprinkled throughout the courthouse. The problem is, no one can check to make sure ANYONE in Bullitt County was actually elected. Shortly after the election, Kathy Greenwell called Black Box Voting. "We first started joking a year ago, that something would be off," Kathy said. "Donnie Tinnell was running against my husband. Everyone was being told that Tinnell was going to be the new sheriff. Tinnell had already told them they weren't going to have a job when he came in.

The current sheriff (Paul Parsley, who lost to Tinnell in the primary) had it as such a sure thing that a lot of the deputies quit months before the election. People who had years in quit." ELECTION NIGHT NOV. 7, 2006 "Paul Parsley's granddaughter was there. Every time they brought in a satchel of the tapes, in goes the granddaughter with two clerks to a filing room. Then they'd come back out and announce the results," says Kathy. "But when they gave someone a total Tuesday night, the first total they tried to make everybody believe that 6,000 people voted. They acted like it was the final count. People raised Cain, they went back and checked, then said it was 13,000 votes. Then a day or two later, it was 17,000 and now it's supposedly 20,000 votes. Each time they said it was the final. We were also told there were missing votes and they couldn't find them."

THE BULLITT COUNTY RECORDS HUNT

Black Box Voting suggested some documents for Kathy to request. While she did that, we filed public records requests all over Kentucky. Black Box Voting got a good sampling of election-related records and responses from Boyle, Caldwell, Calloway, Carroll, Christian, Daviess, Franklin, Gallatin, Garrard, Grayson, Hardin, Henderson, Henry, Hickman, Hopkins, Jefferson, Laurel, Lawrence, Lewis, Meade, Menifee, Metcalf, Muhlenburg, Owen, Pulaski, Rockcastle, Trigg, Trimble, Warren and Woodford counties, but we never got a thing from Bullitt County.

Can you find a more vivid example for why citizens are right to be concerned about elections? If citizens can't get access to the records, we can't oversee our government! But Kathy Greenwell is nothing if not persistent. She finally got copies of the voting machine results tapes, only to find out that about half of them weren't signed by the poll workers as required. It gets more interesting. The results tapes that lack signatures correlate with the machines that had "special attention" from Harp Enterprises, the Kentucky subcontractor for Hart Intercivic. Harp employees had showed up the day after the election to correct "glitches."

And then it gets just plain odd: After calling County Clerk Kevin Mooney's attention to the fact that dozens of the results tapes lack signatures, Mooney "certified" them (even though he wasn't working there in 2006) and also gave Kathy copies of various pages of signatures (but not written on the results tapes). Mooney simply stuck copies of blank pages containing various signatures here and there within the results tape records he had "certified." KENTUCKY FRIED ELECTIONS In Kentucky, the same polling place typically features machines by two different manufacturers.

In Bullitt County, older purchases of ELECTronic 1242 touch-screen machines from Danaher/Shoup/Guardian are combined with newer purchases of e-Slate paperless touch-screens by Hart Intercivic. Bullitt County claims that nearly all of its poll workers signed the results tapes from the ELECTronic 1242s, and at the same time, nearly all the poll workers "forgot" to sign the results tapes from the e-Slate machines. Why would every poll worker in Bullitt County "forget" to sign results tapes only from one brand of machine?

In addition, Kathy noticed that while the ELECTronic 1242 results tapes all contained votes, some of the e-Slate results tapes had dozens (but not all) races with "zero" votes. Here is a copy of the poll results tapes and other information from Bullitt County Kentucky for Nov. 7, 2006: http://www.bbvdocs.org/KY/Bullitt-Nov06.pdf (large - 22 394 KB) And http://www.bbvdocs.org/KY/KY-Bullitt-2006.pdf (7,728 KB)

Kathy does not have access to the Internet. She's not been privy to the vast amount of information on how to audit elections. Still she persisted. She took the "certified" copies of the polling place results tapes to a friend with a computer. Together they spent hours entering every single result into an Excel spreadsheet. There were no election integrity groups nearby, no moral support network. Together Kathy and her friend added up every one of the numbers on every one of the poll tapes. They compared them with the official results provided by Bullitt County, including the absentee votes. They don't match. Here is a pdf copy of the Excel spreadsheet Kathy and her friend labored over, showing that the totals don't match: http://www.bbvdocs.org/KY/KATHY.PDF

So Kathy called Black Box Voting again, and she called the assistant secretary of state for Kentucky. But by the time Bullitt County gave her the records, no remedy under the law was available – even though the results don't match. State officials told Kathy they don't know what they can do for her. They told her she had to file a complaint within 14 days. That's not entirely true. It's true that the deadline for contesting elections has passed but the statute of limitations for fraud has not passed.

Kathy Greenwell has now expended hundreds of dollars for overpriced records missing their signatures which don't match the final tally, "certified" as accurate by a clerk that wasn't even working there in 2006. And now she's getting threats. Welcome to Bullitt County: http://www.bbvdocs.org/KY/welcome.jpg WHAT HAPPENS NEXT? Bullitt County Kentucky will have another election this coming May. If you live in Kentucky (or even in Cincinnati, which is nearby), now would be a good time to put together a small group of citizens to help Kathy keep an eye on Bullitt County elections. IT WOULD HELP KATHY A LOT if she could communicate cost effectively with others, through e-mail.

If anyone in the Louisville or Cincinnati area could donate a computer that is Internet-capable, Kathy Greenwell would have a good home for it. If someone who is tech-savvy can visit to show Kathy how to use e-mail and the Web browser, Black Box Voting will contribute a year's worth of dial-up Internet access for her. (E-mail angels@blackboxvoting.org if you can help, and we'll make the introductions.) NOW ABOUT THOSE THREATS Because Kathy is involved in trying to ensure that local citizens are having their votes counted properly, including those of minority voters, any acts of intimidation may fall under the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which would put prosecution under the auspices of the US Dept. of Justice.

If anything at all happen to Kathy Greenwell, we need to make sure we are just as persistent as Kathy is. Together with Ohio and Kentucky election integrity activists, we will urge immediate action by the state attorney general's office and/or the US Dept. of Justice. BULLITT COUNTY IS BEAUTIFUL IN MAY -- Right around election time. Link to image: Kentucky map with Bullitt County http://www.bbvdocs.org/KY/ky-map.jpg If a posse of friendly citizens would like to head over to Bullitt County to watch for Kentucky fried elections, this year might be a good time to do so. Bullitt County – 20 miles south of Louisville, about an hour from Cincinnati: http://www.travelbullitt.org/

For a story on Kentucky fried elections in another location, click here: http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/1954/32958.html (1) The Lexington Herald-Leader - Thin margins could prompt reviews of 4 legislative races, By Ryan Alessi And Jack Brammer; Nov. 9, 2006 (2) Courier-Journal Louisville, KY - Dishon investigation was rocky from start, trial shows, by Jason Riley; Feb. 3, 2003 (3) Courier-Journal Louisville, KY - Brooks' attorney says investigators ignored other suspects in Dishon slaying, by Jason Riley; Jan. 24 2003 (4) The Courier-Journal Louisville, KY - Charges dismissed in Dishon slaying, by Brian Moore and Jason Riley; Sept. 6, 2003 (5) The Courier-Journal Louisville, KY - W. Ky. crash kills man with linked to Dishon case, by Brandy Warren; Apr. 6, 2006 (6) The Courier-Journal Louisville, KY - Suit against ex-Bullitt sheriff dismissed, by Brandy Warren; Jan. 26, 2007 (7) The Courier-Journal Louisville, KY - BULLITT COUNTY; Vote machine problems create 'mass confusion', by Melissa Gagliardi and Brandy Warren; Nov. 8, 2006 # # # # #

The work Black Box Voting is doing is supported solely by citizen donations. To support our work: http://www.blackboxvoting.org/donate.html Or, mail to: Black Box Voting 330 SW 43rd St Suite K PMB 547 Renton WA 98055

Authors Website: http://www.blackboxvoting.org

Authors Bio:
Bev Harris is executive director of Black Box Voting, Inc. an advocacy group committed to restoring citizen oversight to elections.