Reply #6: New Mexico Mess - Key Lawsuit in NM on Lousy Elections

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http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0511/S00067.htm

New Mexico Law Suit Delves Inside Voting Machines

Thursday, 3 November 2005, 12:30 pm
Article: Michael Collins

Election Errors Threaten Future Voting Rights in New Mexico

Major Law Suit Under Way to Open Up “Secret” Workings of Voting Machines
Special Report for “Scoop” Independent Media
First in a Serie

By Michael Collins
Nov. 2, 2005

Patricia Rosas Lopategui et al… “wishes to have her vote properly counted and weighted in any forthcoming elections.”



New Mexico rarely generates much national news. When it does, as in the Wen Ho Lee nuclear espionage investigation, it can be explosive.

Now a little-known lawsuit before New Mexico District Court Judge Eugenio S. Mathis has the potential to alter the face of American elections.

Lopategui et al versus the State of New Mexico is proceeding at a surprising pace, with the litigants currently in the “discovery” phase of the trial, the point at which lawyers are allowed to question key witnesses and dig for facts and opinions with wide latitude. The targets of discovery right now include Sequoia Elections, two of the big three voting machine companies; Rebecca Vigil-Giron, New Mexico Secretary of State; state and local election officials; and officials of the state’s voting systems support vendor.

Highly disturbing facts and allegations have already emerged in this well-run but under publicized case. For example, in one majority Hispanic precinct, the voting machines produced exactly zero votes for John Kerry. More issues will arise as the Plaintiffs’ legal team digs deeper into the highly irregular events of Election Day 2004. Remarkably, these events occurred at a much higher rate in predominantly Hispanic and Native American precincts.