Contents
1. Coshocton County Prosecutor interviewed about Kettler Complaint; Tim’s Response Follows

2. Link to Full Text of Kettler Complaint

3.  Help get word out for Kettler’s fundraiser and Fitrakis Picnic this Saturday.

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Complaint filed against local Board of Elections office
Staff Reports

WARSAW - Tim Kettler, local Green Party candidate for Secretary of State, submitted a complaint with the Coshocton County Sheriff’s Office and the Coshocton County Prosecutor alleging misconduct during the 2004 Presidential Vote Recount.

According to Kettler, those named in the complaint include the directors and members of the Coshocton County Board of Election, as well as Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell and at least three of his employees. He said the complaint also demands the appointment of a special prosecutor and a court order to preserve documents.

Kettler claims the Republicans and Democrats presently in control of the local election process have failed to conduct elections with transparency and integrity. “We’ve had similar complaints about the Board of Elections (from the general public) ... they may not be factually similar but when private citizens complain they usually do it outside of the time frame of the law,” said County Prosecutor Bob Batchelor. “(Kettler) is about 18 months too late if he wants to contest the results of the General Election of 2004.”

Kettler’s platform calls for the inclusion of Independents and Third Parties at the local board level and the use of hand counted paper ballots to insure a verifiable record of votes cast.

“Due to the increase in absentee voting, there is increased use of optical scan tabulating equipment to count those votes. This type of equipment, the same type used in Coshocton County for the 2004 General Election, has a long track record of unreliability and resulted in over 6 percent of the 2004 Presidential Vote in Coshocton County going uncounted on Election Day,” Kettler said in the statement.

Batchelor said it’s doubtful any legal remedy could be obtained through his office.

Originally published August 18, 2006
The Coshocton Tribune
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Tim’s Response: 

August 20, 2006
To the Editor,

Prosecutor Robert Batchelor’s response to the complaint I filed against members of the Coshocton County Board of Election and Secretary of State Ken Blackwell implies that I am attempting legal action to change the outcome of the last Presidential Race.  Nowhere in the document is there mention of a challenge to the 2004 election. Those words are Mr. Batchelor’s and he has his own motives for portraying the complaint in that light.

The filing is a criminal complaint resulting from the events surrounding the Presidential Recount of 2004 and the actions taken by the Board of Election. The facts show that over 6% of the 2004 Presidential vote in Coshocton County went uncounted on Election Day. Factual evidence also shows that the Board of Election intended to violate the procedures for random selection of precincts to be recounted, handled and recounted ballots without witnesses present and without proper 5 day notification to the candidates, that they recounted ballots and altered the certified totals of the election when they discovered the failure of the tabulating equipment and presented these altered vote totals to the candidates witnesses as the official count of the general election of November 2, 2004, totals that may be deemed false election returns. These and other events of interest occurred prior to the official recount conducted on December 14, 2004, when ballots were improperly stored and again handled without the presence of candidates’ witnesses.

It is my opinion that the members and directors of the Coshocton County Board of Election willfully violated election law set forth in the Ohio Revised Code and that these violations may be prosecutable as both misdemeanors and felonies. The questions before the Prosecutor concerning the complaint are:

1) Did these events in fact occur?

2) Are the actions taken by those named in the complaint in conflict with the provisions of the law?

3) Is the complaint filed within the timeline provided by the law?

If the answers to these questions are yes it is the Prosecutor’s duty as representative of the people of Coshocton County to take appropriate action.

As for the “legal remedy” Mr. Batchelor referred to; participation in Ohio elections is abysmally low, due in part to the lack of confidence in the honesty and integrity of those conducting them, and the diminishing transparency of the system itself. Encouraging and empowering full citizen participation is essential to our democracy and accountability on all levels is vital to that effort. The Cuyahoga County prosecutor in a recent case involving the Board of Election removed himself in the interests of fairness and the appointed special prosecutor then issued indictments for similar violations as those alleged in the Coshocton complaint. I urge Mr. Batchelor to do the same.

Ohioans should be aware that these are not isolated events. Several county boards of election throughout Ohio acted illegally to deny a full and complete accounting of the election. It is my intention to fight for the public’s right to fair, honest and transparent elections.

Tim Kettler
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2. Link to Full Text of Tim’s criminal complaint against the Coshocton County Board of Election:

Read the entire complaint filed in Coshocton County, Ohio at http://www.sostim06.com

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3. Help get word out for Kettler’s fundraiser and Fitrakis Picnic this Saturday.

I hope many of you are planning to attend the events in Columbus this weekend. We need help publicizing the events.  Flyers can be downloaded from the following site:

http://www.sostim06.com/images/fundraiserAug.pdf

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