Case No. CV 0402764

Dept. No. 6

IN THE SECOND JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT

STATE OF NEVADA

Rick Newell Davis, Plaintiff

vs.

Joe Brown, John Marvel, Milton Schwartz, Beverly Willard, Paul Willis

VOTER ELECTION CONTEST

WRITTEN STATEMENT OF CONTEST

   1. Jurisdiction. First: NRS 293.407(1) provides that any "registered voter of the appropriate political subdivision may contest the election of any candidate except for the office of United States Senator or Representative in Congress." The "appropriate political subdivision" in this contest of the election of presidential electors is the State of Nevada. Second: NRS 293.407(2) provides that "a voter who wishes to contest the election, including election to the office of presidential elector, must, within the time prescribed in NRS 293.413, file with the clerk of the district court, a written statement of contest." Third: Undersigned Contestants are registered voters of the State of Nevada, who contest the election of presidential electors in Nevada, in the manner stated in NRS 293.407(2), by filing "with the clerk of the district court a written statement of contest."

   2. Gist of Contest. First: It has been adjudicated by the Second Judicial District Court that certain Nevada voters had been unlawfully denied the right to vote in the 2004 general election, even though they had, in accordance with NRS 293.090, "completed the procedure prescribed for law for the registration of a voter." The Second Judicial Court, on November 2, 2004 (Case No. CV04-02648), ordered that voters who had registered to vote but who were not permitted to vote because their registration applications had not been turned in, should be permitted to vote in the 2004 general election. The Second Judicial District Court reasoned that election officials and not the citizen-victims of a malfunctioning voter registration operation should bear the burden of errors in the registration process. Contestants believe the voter contest statute empowers the Court to remedy faulty and incorrect election results and that, by adopting the reasoning of the Second Judicial District Court (that election officials rather than disenfranchised voters should bear the burden of a denial of the right to vote), all victims of faulty registration who can demonstrate that they filled out registration applications before duly authorized voter registrars should be granted the right to vote within a period of 48 hours of the date of the Court’s order and, further, to have their vote tallied in the final results of the 2004 election. Second: Six United States Congressmen have now requested a national investigation into voter fraud and irregularities. Given increasing evidence of election machine malfunction throughout the country, Contestants ask the court, within the scope of this election contest, not for a recount, but, rather for an order allowing Contestants to examine Nevada’s voting machines and their software.

   3. Statutory Requirements. As required by NRS 293.407 and NRS 293.410 the undersigned declare: (1) Contestants are Citizens of the United States and of the State of Nevada and are duly registered voters of the State of Nevada and of the County and Precinct stated in the verification declaration signed below. (2) the particular grounds of contest are fully stated below in the paragraph 4, "Grounds." (3) Contestants are informed and believe that declarations and canvasses of defendants as presidential electors have been and will be by the various county clerks and by the supreme court, upon dates determined by law and by the canvassing and declaring bodies. (4) The applicable NRS sections are Chapter 293, Sections 407, 410, 413. 415, 417, 423, 504, and 505. (5) Defendants are the five 2004 Republican presidential electors: Joe Brown, John Marvel, Milton Schwartz, Beverly Willard and Paul Willis.

   4. Grounds. There are four grounds for this contest. The first ground is the above-stated, vote-depriving registration malfunctions adjudicated by the Second Judicial District Court. The second ground is based on evidence (now under investigation by the FBI and State Attorney General) leading to the possible conclusion that a voter registration organization, sponsored and financed by the Republican National Committee, either directed or permitted its agents to register voters in a manner that unlawfully deprived thousands of Nevada voters of their right to vote. The question presented by this ground is not whether there have been unlawful denials of the right to vote but, rather, how many eligible, prospective voters were unlawfully denied their right to vote. The third ground is that, given what appears to be ever-growing evidence of massive election irregularities or fraud, Contestants deem it necessary and advisable to contest the accuracy of Nevada’s voting machines. The fourth ground is specifically based on NRS 293.410 {f) in that "there was a possible malfunction of any voting or counting device," namely that devices designed to provide for an orderly and accurate registration process malfunctioned in such a way as to disenfranchise thousands of voters and that voting devices are believed not to have accurately reflected how Nevada voters actually voted in the 2004 general election.

   5. Information Supporting Contestant’s Position. As stated, the primary question raised by this contest is not if voter registrants have been unlawfully denied their right to vote, but, rather, how many prospective registrants were denied the right to vote and if this number was more likely than not to have affected the outcome of the presidential election. Contestants are informed of the following errors and irregularities: Faulty and malfunctioning registration practices that have resulted in a number of registered voters not being placed on the voters register and poll book, as required by law, thus denying them the right to vote. Allegations of unlawful activities, include the following: that Democratic voter registrations have been torn up; that registration officials were being paid on a per- Republican registration basis; and that there has been badgering of potential registrants to register Republican.

      5.1. Media sources report that some 300 of the registrars financed by the Republican National Committee had been instructed by persons presently unknown to Contestants to register only Republican registrants or to destroy Democratic registrations. These officially authorized registrars were reported to have been acting for more than three months and to have collected hundreds of registrations per day. If these allegations prove to be true, many thousands of eligible registrants were denied their right to vote or were unlawfully coerced to register in a certain political party. Contestants will call upon the FBI and Nevada Attorney General to produce any evidence of election fraud or irregularity and; if feasible, Contestants will take depositions as authorized by NRS 293.415 in order to discover the true nature of the massive irregularities that appear to have plagued the 2004 general election. Contestants contend that the mentioned errors and irregularities substantially affected the results of the 2004 election.
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   6. Relief Sought by Contestants. Contestants believe and contend that the basic legislative intent of the voter contest statutes is to allow a modification and correction of election results in cases in which it can be established that substantial errors were made in the election process; accordingly, Contestants contend that there were massive irregularities and malfunctions in the registration process, that these irregularities were the responsibility of election officials and not the disenfranchised victims of these errors, and that election officials should, therefore, be commanded to permit the disenfranchised persons to complete registration and to vote, even though election day, November 2, 2004, has passed. Contestants also contend that there has been insufficient supervision and transparency in the process of voting by touch-screen machines; accordingly they ask for the right to have the process reviewed by independent computer experts.

VERIFICATION DECLARATION

Rick Newell Davis verifies the above Voter Election Contest and declares under penalty of perjury that all of the statements contained in this Voter Election Contest are true to best of my knowledge or based on my information and belief.

Dated: Nov. 16, 2004

County of Residence: Douglas

Precinct Number:

Rick Newell Davis
Contestant