Looks like what we're learning is that even if we recount the votes, the 'chain of custody' issue is equally as important as the counting of votes, and something looks pretty fishy about the chain of custody in New Hampshire...


"No worries, say New Hampshire officials when cuts up to eight inches long are spotted in newly delivered ballot boxes. "The only seal that counts is the one on top."

Except the seal on top can be peeled off without leaving a trace, then reaffixed.

Black Box Voting has been doing a chain of custody exam for the New Hampshire Primary's recount. On Wednesday night, Election Defense Alliance's Sally Castleman mentioned a troubling observation: After following the ballots back to the ballot vault following Wednesday's recount, she had the opportunity to enter the ballot vault, and noticed what looked like cuts, or slits, in the side of many ballot boxes. New Hampshire officials assured us that these cuts, which slice through the tape and seals do not permit access to the uncounted ballots, pointing to a label on the boxtop which they call a seal.

But the "seal" can be removed, like a Post-it, and reaffixed. So it's not a seal all!

We wanted to know if the ballot boxes were slit while in the vault, in the transport van, or came from the towns with slits in them.

I confirmed this morning that many if not most of the boxes scheduled to be counted today had slits in them. I went out when a vanload of ballots arrived, and saw that they were slit at the time they arrived by van. Susan Pynchon and I drove to two nearby towns and watched as they handed over their ballot boxes to "Butch and Hoppy", the two men who drive around in the state in a van picking the ballots up. We observed as they loaded boxes of ballots into the van with no slits at all in them. We videotaped each of these up close. They arrived at the destination without slits. The label on the top was affixed, but in some cases was crumpled, or also damaged.

Of cource, the label affixed to the top can be removed and reattached without telltale signs."

http://www.bbvforums.org/cgi-bin/forums/board-auth.cgi?file=/1954/71404.html


If we want to be confident in the results of our elections, we're going to need to have better accountability in the way the ballots are handled, along with verifiability in the form of a paper trail. I think the best method would be to have a system in which the voter gets a printed receipt when he or she casts a vote, so that even if there is any tampering of the ballots as they are being handled, there will be a separate paper trail in the custody of the voters that could be used as a reference during recounts.