Franken Legal Team: Coleman Is Doctoring Evidence
At a pre-trial hearing in the Minnesota election lawsuit just now, Franken attorney Kevin Hamilton made a striking accusation: That the Coleman campaign has been doctoring evidence.
As an example, Hamilton showed two photocopies of a rejected absentee ballot envelope, one of which he said was the unaltered original, and the other taken from Coleman's legal filings in his attempts to get more of the rejected ballots opened. The Coleman copy was missing the section in which a local election official explained why it was rejected.
"We would not be able to stipulate to the authenticity of a document where the key portion has been cut out," Hamilton complained.
Coleman attorney James Langdon expressed his absolute surprise. "What he has pointed out is news to me," said Langdon. "There has been no effort on our part to be anything other than absolutely truthful."
Langdon speculated that there may have been a photocopying problem.
The court took no action on this for now, instead asking the parties to first try to work out any differences on evidence between themselves.
Josh
Elana
Matt
Eric
Haha, photocopying problem. Yes, after all, photocopying is one of those newfangled technologies that are really hard to figure out.
*Place entire document in copy machine, not cutting off certain parts that clash with your case*
*Enter the number of copies you wish to make*
*Press the green button, or one that says "start" or "copy"*
January 23, 2009 1:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Maybe they were using one of those "special" copiers that they used to have in the Bush White House.
January 23, 2009 1:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
You mean the shredders?
January 25, 2009 1:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Dude...seriously...Copy machines are even easier than TurboTax...lol
January 23, 2009 1:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
The page was missing just like the WMD in Iraq where Bush sent over 4,000 Americans to their deaths! LOL SFC! Probably a Republican copy machine.
January 23, 2009 1:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yet they seem to surpass Coleman and his entire legal staff
January 23, 2009 2:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
That is bad news for Coleman. Evidence tampering is a big NO, NO in every court in the land. This one seems to be easy to prove. My guess is one of the really religious graduates of Regency Law School working for Coleman thought she could get away with one just like they did in the old days of the Gonzo DOJ. After all Franken is a Democrat, which makes him subhuman.
January 23, 2009 1:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
GOTHA...
There is something they all forgot, they are sworn officers of the court.
Tampering and if they have other pieces submitted that find the gotcha will kill them in the eyes of the panel.
January 23, 2009 7:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
A Xerox malfunction. Brilliant.
January 23, 2009 1:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Give him a break. He had to think fast. It was either that or "the dog ate that part of the copy".
January 23, 2009 1:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
It will take more than one photocopy as proof of evidence tampering. Franken is just trying to muddy the waters maybe to place a shadow of doubt in the judges minds regarding anything Coleman says or does, because if he had more examples he would have showed them today.
January 23, 2009 1:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Not true at all. If one has been doctored, then all become suspect. Court cases frequently involve opposing and mutually exclusive claims, not all of which are provable. It often comes down to who's to be believed, and this casts a definite cloud over Coleman's believability.
January 23, 2009 1:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Jonze: Think a minute -- I suppose you believe that whoever did Coleman's copying was conspiring with Franken?
The error exists -- conceivably there is a relatively innocent explanation but it is certainly not the place of Franken's attornies to assume the good faith of Coleman.
January 23, 2009 2:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've seen cases where opposing counsel tried crap like this with a built in "oops, honest mistake technical failure" path to plausible deniability, and I've seen cases where opposing counsel pilloried and inveighed and called down hellfire and brimstone over what truly was an accidental deviation from clerical competence. Except where it's so gross as to be obvious to a five year old, my nearly invariable experience has been that the side that's truly in the wrong is the one that gets away with it.
January 23, 2009 2:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
I do hate to say it, but this sounds right.
January 23, 2009 2:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
"... it is certainly not the place of Franken's attornies to assume the good faith of Coleman."
Especially where Coleman has the burden of proof.
January 23, 2009 3:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
If one example of clearly altered documents has been submitted to the court, it implies that there is other evidence submitted to the court that has also been tampered with. It's just that no one has caught the other stuff because it was done more efficiently.
That one piece of evidence is clearly altered. It was no accident, no matter how the attorney spins it. The attorney had to put a positive face on it, trying to make it appear to be unintentional.
That attorney submitting the "evidence" has every reason to spin big time. He probably signed something stating that it was a true and correct copy of the original document when he submitted it to the court. That makes this a very big thing. From now on, he has to defend his reputation before the courts in every case he ever tries again. It won't be forgotten by his opposing counsel in the future. Ever.
By the way, the statistical population of documents that altered document is representative of is the set of is those submitted to the court as evidence by Coleman's attorneys, not the total number of questioned ballots. The number submitted to the court is a relatively small number. As such, the one identified event is a vary large subset of that population.
Since the document was altered after selection, the document submitted to the court is not representative of the larger set of all questioned ballots. Which, of course, was the exact point that Franken's attorneys was making. Of course, they were also making the point that the attorneys involved were very sloppy in processing evidence, which they clearly were.
January 23, 2009 2:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
How many counterexamples are required to invalidate an argument?
January 23, 2009 3:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Judges have their jobs to answer that question - or not to decide, and instead tell the parties to go resolve it. Then they decide if the resolution meets the requirements of the law. They not only decide on issues, they determine the procedures to be use to decide.
I'm not saying that one single identified counterexample is necessarily sufficient to entirely invalidate the arguments presented by the Coleman attorneys. I'm saying that the single incident should cause everything else the Coleman side says, does or offers as evidence to support their arguments to by put under a really close microscope and approached very skeptically. The Coleman people have proven themselves unreliable, unprofessional, and unworthy of trust.
January 24, 2009 12:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Right, because it's always smart lawyering to lay all your cards out on the table. That Coleman's camp screwed up this way may not be incontrovertible proof to you, but it certainly turns the recount brouhaha from an election problem to a Coleman problem. How many other corners are they cutting? None of us know, but as the current underdogs they'd be wiser to make sure their ducks are all in a row. Y'know? Like, what if the judge thinks (or is caused to think) that Coleman's suit is founded upon faulty eyes on their part?
Then again, if Coleman's just playing games...
January 23, 2009 5:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
"The court took no action"...
Gotta love it.
January 23, 2009 1:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
The issue here is the judges response: "Work it out between yourselves." That's the same bullshit response that got us here in the first place. Remember our Republican Supreme court said it was up to the campaigns to decide which wrongly rejected absentee ballots to count?
Now we've got lawsuits being filed by voters whose ballots were first wrongly rejected by registrars and then rejected by the campaigns. This is what you get when Republicans appoint judges.
January 23, 2009 1:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Amen.
January 23, 2009 2:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
As opposed to "only count our guy's votes..."which is what you get when Democrats appoint judges (see FL Supreme Court)...Amen! (I knew none of yall would say it).
January 23, 2009 2:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, the in 2000 the FL Supreme Court ruled that recounting should not be done only in selected counties and that ALL counties in Florida do a manual recount.
Facts are stubborn things...
January 23, 2009 3:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
And the fraudulent "SFC" is a stubborn, if particularly obtuse, thing.
January 23, 2009 3:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
"In a per curiam decision, by a 7–2 vote, the Court in Bush v. Gore held that the Florida Supreme Court's method for recounting ballots was a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment."
Don't believe there were 7 Republican appointees at the time...
January 23, 2009 3:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
HAHAHAHA. Even the Supreme Court knew their decision was untenable.
"Our consideration is limited to the present circumstances,..."
Translation: "This decision is so flawed it should never be used as precedent."
Does anyone seriously doubt that if Gore was ahead they would have ruled differently?
January 23, 2009 3:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
We pause briefly for a fact-check...(always helpful when dealing with SFC). There WERE 7 Republican appointees at the time...Rehnquist (Nixon), Stevens (Ford), O'Connor, Kennedy, Scalia (Reagan), Souter, Thomas (Poppy Bush).
More to the point, yes, that part of the day's decisions was 7-2. The second part, which stopped any further recounting regardless of method, and effectively made W the 'President-Select', went 5-4 (with Stevens and Souter moving back into dissent).
It's worth revisiting the words or Justice Stevens, speaking in opposition:
“Although we may never know with complete certainty the identity of the winner of this year’s Presidential election, the identity of the loser is perfectly clear. It is the Nation’s confidence in the judge as an impartial guardian of the rule of law”.
I must hand it to you, SFC, in your choice of icons...There was no one better than Ronald Reagan when it came to smiling, sunny assertions of half-truths and un-truths!
January 23, 2009 4:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
Come on, dude, are you really that dumb? Take a look at the answer to your pathetic claim. Are you really an idiot or do you just not care whether what you say is true or not? Either way, you fit in well with the Republican Party today.
January 23, 2009 4:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
How is it that you could be so ignorant SFCWallace?
January 24, 2009 2:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, that's most judges' response to most disputes that are brought before them. Most seem to feel that silly lawyers who have this bizarre idea that judges are paid to adjudicate disputes just need a good talking to, followed by a firm admonishment to play nice and a reminder that sharing is caring.
January 23, 2009 5:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good point Jonze, and I completely agree with you. There is always the possibility that this really was a mistake by one of the legal staffers. That said, because Coleman submitted it as evidence and it clearly is tampered with, although voluntary or involuntary is not known, the evidence on this ballot is now tainted and it makes Franken's case look a little cleaner and clearer in court. Coleman is clearly thowing a hail mary and hoping for the best. Let's just hope that he is not as good as Doug Flutie was at throwing the bomb.
January 23, 2009 1:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Take it from one who regularly testifies as an expert witness as part of his job: pissing off judges is a really bad idea even if it actually is accidental. (No, hasn't happened to me, but I've seen lawyers do it. Bad move.)
January 23, 2009 1:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Photocopiers are crooked lawyers' and pols' worst enemy. Years ago I worked on a ballot initiative opposed by our secretary of state, who was a known crook. He tried pulling a number of shenanigans which we deflected. Finally he announced he had completed counting, and we failed to turn in enough signatures. I go over the totals per county and find there's like 5,000 uncounted signatures in one county. So I call over there and get one of his minions on the phone, and the guy insists they've counted every single petition submitted in that county. So I say, "ok, well then, I guess our next step needs to be for us to sit down with you with our copies to determine which petitions you lost." Dead silence for a moment, then "you have copies?" Oh yes, I say, we have a copy of every single petition we turned in. He says, let me get back to you...and by the end of business that day, not only had the "missing" petitions been miraculously found - but all the signatures on them had been verified as well and added to the total! A true miracle of efficient government, that was.
January 23, 2009 1:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
They probably mistook the copier for a shredder. Once you shred it, there is no evidence that can be contradicted.
January 23, 2009 2:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Got a bad connection here; hpoe this isn't a duplicate.
Work it out amongst yourselves... sounds like true believers in free markets being self-regulating.
Before everybody goes off half-cocked, I need to point out that IF the note on the envelope was written in blue ink, that COULD explain this.
January 23, 2009 2:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Blue ink photocopies just fine.
January 23, 2009 3:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
There used to be certain types of blue (cyan, actually) ink that did not, and it was quite deliberate. The pens were marketed expressly for that purpose. It was used to keep downstream copies clean while allowing notes to be made.
Modern copiers use different lights to illuminate the original, so this no longer works.
January 23, 2009 3:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
Even if that were the case here (and I have serious doubts about that), isn't it incumbent on the legal team preparing the evidence to assure that the copy is a reasonably good facsimile of the original? Especially on the question of crucial parts of the evidence? I certainly would want that done if I were signing my name to an affidavit that said that the submitted copies were a true and accurate representation of the evidence.
January 23, 2009 5:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
As a former copier technician, I can state that the blue ink problem went away when selenium and arsenic drums were banned and organic drums took over in the late '80s.
January 23, 2009 7:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
There is something called non-repro blue, but it is a very light almost robin's egg blue. Though there is a pen ink of this color, graphics artists usually use a non-repro blue pencil. And, nowadays with digital layouts, very few people use non-repro blue pencils.
There is absolutely no problem copying regular blue ink.
January 24, 2009 12:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Coleman's lawyer said "There has been no effort on our part to be anything other than absolutely truthful."
Where to start? Republican...Coleman...lawyer...truthful...
Stop, please, you're killin' me.
I'm laughing so hard I can hardly breathe.
Remember, only two types vote Republican: Millionaires and suckers.
And even the Millionaires are voting Democratic now.
January 23, 2009 2:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Millionaires and suckers. EXACTLY.
It is like ending the Estate Tax by calling it a Death Tax. That sure sounds good to the rubes and the fools but when you understand how very very few people are actually paying this tax, and how much money you have to inherit to get past the threshold, it is AMAZING to watch the Republicans sell this shit. What it amounts to is talking very gullible people into paying MORE in taxes to cover the millionaires who get away with paying less, on money they inherited. Why do they think we are so stupid? Because as Bush proved twice, we are stupid enough.
January 24, 2009 4:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's change you can Xerox!
January 23, 2009 3:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
ACORN did it!
January 23, 2009 3:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Surprise. Yawn.
January 23, 2009 3:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
While it is tempting to suggest this was a deliberate attempt to tamper, the realtiy is we have a single document out of what I presume are hundreds or even thousands of such documents. It seems entirely plausible to me that it could truly have been a simple error. Ever ran a stack of documents through one of those separators that rolls each sheet onto the glass? Ever seen one fold a corner or suck two pages through at the same time? I have.
Don't get me wrong, I am for Franken all the way, I just don't like hyperventilating for no reason. Now, if they find other altered documents...well that would be differnt.
January 23, 2009 5:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
If you're filing a lawsuit and consequently the burden of proof is up to you, you'd best not cut your own legs out from under you and make the burden even heavier.
January 23, 2009 6:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
LOL. Well-said.
January 26, 2009 6:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ah yes, a toner issue! Maybe the fact that Coleman is apparently tone deaf and didn't hear the electorate tell him to get the hell out!
January 24, 2009 9:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, this is a bigger deal than it first seems. No, you're not going see Colemans' lawyers being prosecuted for presenting false evidence. But if the judge sees he can't trust you, you are probably toast. In court a lawyer's word is his bond and that applies to EVERTHING you present. "Oops, I didn't know," won't fly.
January 25, 2009 2:01 PM | Reply | Permalink