Prometheus 6

The audit found more problems with the way the election was administered -- some optical scan ballots were scanned twice while others weren't scanned at all. This kind of problem isn't new to Cuyahoga. Two audit reports on last year's May primary in the county revealed severe data tracking problems by the election staff. And two Cuyahoga election workers were convicted in January of tampering with a recount in the 2004 presidential election by cherry-picking precincts for recount that they knew would match the election results. They were concerned they'd have to work overtime if the recount didn't match the results.

All of these issues led to the resignation of Election Director Michael Vu and the four members of Cuyahoga's board of elections. Vu's problems in Ohio haven't affected his job prospects, however. He was recently hired as assistant registrar of voters in San Diego.

Ohio Audit Says Diebold Vote Database May Have Been Corrupted

Problems found in an audit of Diebold tabulation records from an Ohio November 2006 election raise questions about whether the database got corrupted during the tabulation of election results, says a report released today (pdf).

The document, from a team of researchers tasked with auditing the November election in troubled Cuyahoga County, have called for a thorough examination of the database to determine if corruption did occur and the extent to which it may have affected the election results.

(A note on the report: the version I'm publishing here is a draft version that says "not for distribution." Two people distributed the report to me separately with the only instructions being I should not publish it until 11 am eastern time. The draft version contains numerous appendices that don't appear in the final version. For info on the corrupt database, see p. 66 of the report.)