JUDGE SCOLDS COUNTY OFFICIALS OVER ELECTRONIC VOTING RECORD

A judge chided Alameda County officials Friday for giving away the
only internal electronic records of a contested election to Diebold
Election Systems Inc., after an appeals court ordered the county to
preserve the records.

Alameda County Superior Court Judge Winifred Smith's scolding came as
a medical marijuana group, Americans for Safe Access, sought
penalties against the county for getting rid of its touch screen
voting machines last summer without first downloading the electronic
ballots and internal logs related to contested Measure R, a marijuana
initiative that Berkeley voters rejected in 2004.

What Alameda County did with those 420 touch screen voting machines
could reaffirm the results of Berkeley's election - or, if
discrepancies are found in the internal electronic data, result in a
replay of that election in 2008, plus financial penalties for the county.

Deputy County Attorney Nancy Fenton said county officials and Diebold
have identified most of the machines by serial number and were
confident of identifying the rest in a few days. They plan on
downloading the internal memory and showing the data to
representatives of Americans for Safe Access.

But it is possible that, more than two years and six elections after
Measure R and the filing of a lawsuit challenging its results, the
internal electronic data sought by Americans for Safe Access as a
check on the official vote count is gone forever.

Smith did not say when she might rule.