It's not over until Rove & Co. are in jail
A funny thing happened on the way to a McCain "victory" in Ohio and other
states.
Karl Rove's computer guru got hauled into court the day before election
day and was ordered to testify about what he did during the 2004 vote
count in Ohio.
Republican IT "Guru" Mike Connell Ordered To Give Deposition
By Steve Heller
Cross-posted at The BRAD BLOG.
Contentious Hearing Today Results in Order For Republican 'High-Tech Forrest
Gump' to Testify Under Oath on Monday
Appearance to Answer Questions on 2004 Election Scheduled Just 24 Hours Prior
to Election 2008...
The Republican IT guru, recently described as a "high tech Forrest
Gump" for his proclivity to be "at the scene" of so many troubling
elections since 2000, and even at the heart of the "lost" White House
email scandal, has been ordered by a federal judge to appear for an
under-oath deposition next Monday in Ohio.
The BRAD BLOG has learned that Mike Connell, the Republican IT guru
whose company, GovTech Solutions, created Ohio's 2004 election results
computer network appeared in federal court today, as compelled, and has
been ordered to appear for his deposition on Monday, November 3, just
24 hours before Election Day 2008.
Today's court order came after a contentious hearing, at which Connell
was present. The hearing was part of a long-standing voting rights
violations lawsuit, King Lincoln v. Blackwell, as previously covered by
The BRAD BLOG and by Velvet Revolution's Election Protection Strike
Force here and here.
Though Connell's attorneys have fought to quash the subpoena, recently
issued after the judge lifted a stay on the case several weeks ago, ,
it looks like his options to avoid testimony, or at least jail for
avoiding it, may have come to an end. The attorneys in the case have
said that Connell's testimony may well lead to the subpoenaing and
under-oath questioning of Karl Rove, who, they say, would be unable to
use Executive Privilege as an excuse to avoid such a subpoena in a
civil RICO case...
For more details on Connell, and his role in the '04 election, and
within the GOP, see the video clip at right from John Ennis'
recently-released documentary Free For All.
The issues in the King Lincoln v. Blackwell suit are complex, but in a
nutshell, some Ohio voters filed a lawsuit alleging voting rights
violations and election irregularities in the 2004 Presidential
election in the Buckeye State. Taking the sworn deposition of Connell,
the man who set up the computers for reporting election results, and
re-routing them through his company's own Tennessee servers late on the
night of the '04 election, has been a high priority for Election
Integrity advocates and attorneys in Ohio.
While this story is still breaking and developing, from what we've been
able to learn so far, sources tell us that Monday's depo will have a
time limit of two hours. Any information gathered regarding trade
secrets related to Connell's company, GovTech Solutions, will be under
seal, as per the judge's order today.
Also under seal will be any and all information gathered about
allegations that Connell has been the victim of witness intimidation by
Karl Rove and/or Rove's associates. As reported by The BRAD BLOG last
Summer, plaintiff's lead attorney in the case, Clifford A. Arnebeck,
had sent an email to Attorney General Michael Mukasey on July 24, 2008,
stating in part:
"We have been confidentially informed by a source we believe to be
credible that Karl Rove has threatened Michael Connell, a principal
witness we have identified in our King Lincoln case in federal court in
Columbus, Ohio, that if he does not agree to 'take the fall' for
election fraud in Ohio, his wife Heather will be prosecuted for
supposed lobby law violations."
In related news, our friends at RAW STORY have an article today
headlined "Documents reveal how Ohio routed 2004 voting data through
company that hosted external Bush Administration email accounts." That
company was SmarTech, Inc., and the architecture for the 2004 election
results reporting system in Ohio has been at the heart of this case.
As reported by RAW's Larisa Alexandrovna today:
Newly obtained computer schematics provide further detail of how
electronic voting data was routed during the 2004 election from Ohio's
Secretary of State's office through a partisan Tennessee web hosting
company. ... The flow chart shows how voting information was
transferred from Ohio to SmarTech Inc., a Chattanooga Tennessee IT
company known for its close association with the Republican Party,
before the 2004 election results were displayed online.
See her story for more, including the schematics for both the '04 and
'06 web servers in Ohio. Of course, we'll continue to update this story
as the case proceeds...
http://www.velvetrevolution.us/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/199
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