I found this but it's not what you want I don't think.
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orlandosentinel.com
Seminole suit moved to Tallahassee
By Rene Stutzman and Kevin P. Connolly
of the Sentinel Staff
Published in The Orlando Sentinel on November 28, 2000
SANFORD -- The dispute over Seminole County`s 15,000 absentee ballots shifted Monday to Tallahassee, to the same courthouse where Vice President Al Gore is contesting the official results of Florida`s presidential election.
For now, the two issues are separate suits, but Republicans said Monday they would press to consolidate the cases.
After a contentious court hearing Monday morning, attorneys for Longwood Democrat Harry Jacobs and Seminole`s Supervisor of Elections, Sandy Goard, the Florida GOP and GOP candidate George W. Bush asked Circuit Judge Debra S. Nelson to dismiss the case, or short of that, to transfer it to Tallahassee.
Before the judge could rule, Jacobs` attorneys agreed to simply refile the suit in Tallahassee.
They immediately flew to Tallahassee and did just that. It`s not clear, however, what will happen next or when something will happen.
The trial had been set to begin Wednesday in Sanford.
Continuing saga. Lawyers involved in the Seminole County lawsuit explain on Monday why they agreed to mote it to a Tallahassee court. The lawyers were (from left) Stephen Braga, representing the George W. Bush; Terry Young, representing the Seminole County Canvassing Board; and Gerald Richman, attorney for Harry Jacobs. (Dennis Wall/Orlando Sentinel)
Bringing the suits together would slow down both cases, something Gore wants to avoid as he faces a Dec. 12 deadline, the date Florida must choose the members of its electoral college. Consolidation would also cause a public-relations problem for Gore, who has kept his distance from the Seminole suit
If Gore were pulled into it, he could appear to be a hypocrite. Throwing out all of the county`s absentee votes, including thousands that were cast legitimately, would go against Gore`s mantra of making every vote count.
But that`s exactly what the Seminole suit seeks.
It would be interesting to see Gore`s attorneys try to make both arguments at the same time, said Ken Wright, a GOP attorney.
"I think they want to keep this case as distant from Gore as they can get it," he said.
For the GOP, time is clearly on George W. Bush`s side now, said Don Weidner, a Jacksonville attorney specializing in election law. With the Dec. 12 deadline looming, Gore must not only win in court, but he must do it quickly enough to allow local officials time to complete the recounts he is demanding.
For now, neither Gore`s campaign nor the Democratic Party is directly involved with the Seminole suit.
"This ain`t our lawsuit," said Mark Herron, an attorney for the state Democratic Party.
The vice president has instructed Gore`s legal team to stay out of the suit, a source close to Gore`s legal team told the Orlando Sentinel. In fact, the suit was originally included in Gore`s pleadings but was removed before the suit was filed in Tallahassee, the source said.
Orlando lobbyist Dick Batchelor, a prominent Democrat, said he suspects the suit is troubling to the Gore campaign because it risks tossing out votes that were legitimately cast, as well as votes that might have resulted from invalid requests for absentee ballots that were salvaged by GOP workers.
It`s not right, he said, to punish voters who did nothing wrong.
Jacobs, a Longwood Democrate, filed suit Nov. 17, asking that all 15,000 of the county`s absentee ballots be thown out. If that happens, that would mean a 5,000-vote swing in Gore`s favor.
The suit accuses elections supervisor Goard of letting two Florida GOP operatives work out of her office two or three weeks before the election, adding voter identification numbers to absentee ballot requests. She had previously thrown them in a box of rejects, saying they were invalid because they lacked the numbers.
The suit alleges that the GOP is guilty of voter fraud and Goard of misconduct.
Jacobs` attorneys want to continue questioning Goard and other witnesses. That could resume today.
Although there is no direct tie to Gore, the people involved in the Jacobs suit have strong ties to the Democratic Party.
Jacobs served as a Democratic observer to Seminole County`s recount and vote certification. His lead attorney, Gerald Richman, is a Palm Beach County Democrat who ran for Congress in 1989 and narrowly lost to Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.
Robert Perez, Michael Griffin and Gwyneth Shaw of the Sentinel staff contributed to this report.
Posted Nov 27 2000 10:50PM |
