Grogan Graffam, P.C. Closes Its Doors

Posted: Monday, April 18, 2016 by Pezzonovante in Labels: , ,
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Grogan Graffam, P.C. , the firm which represented the scofflaw Friends of Tim Mahoney campaign committee in the Voucher Request cases closed its doors on April 15, 2016.

 The GG homepage gives its thanks and says goodbye.

 To which this space can only say: Good riddance!!



PA Commonwealth Court Senior Judge Quigley's Pernicious Election Case Rulings

Posted: Sunday, April 17, 2016 by Pezzonovante in Labels: , ,
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The previous post in this space, in part, dealt with the errant opinions in 215 MD 2013 and in 359 MD 2014 reached by Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court Senior Judge Keith B. Quigley and how those opinions destroyed the Voucher Request statute and obliterated the right of persons, upon request, to see vouchers (i.e., receipted bills detailing the particulars of expenditures made by campaign committees to influence the outcome of elections).

 The post pointed out the "pernicious decision of a judge who contradicted PA Supreme Court case precedent (In re: Canvass of Absentee Ballots of 2003) and his own former ruling (2357 CD 2009) that cited it. . . ."

 We turn now to the scintillating election case that resulted in Judge Quigley's ruling in 2357 CD 2009.

 The race in the 2009 Municipal Election for Bellevue Council (a suburb of Pittsburgh) Ward 1 pitted Democrat Jane Braunlich against Republican David Piet.

 Initially, Braunlich eked out a 210-209 victory in the election -- a razor-thin margin of just one vote. 

 Days after the election, a lost, sealed, absentee ballot was discovered in the trunk of a vehicle of a judge of elections.

 The sealed absentee ballot was taken to the Allegheny County Division of Elections, opened there, and tallied.
The absentee ballot was cast by Walter Daughenbaugh, a National Guardsman serving his country on active duty military service.

 What had been a razon-thin margin of victory for Braunlich had now metamorphosed into a 210-210 tie.

 To break the tie, Braunlich and Piet drew lots (pellets); Piet won and was declared the victor.

 Braunlich appealed the decision by the Allegheny County Division of Elections to the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas.  In the court's decision (link pgs. 141-142), it cited numerous sections of case law that pointed toward the paramount importance of enfranchisement of electors, not their disenfranchisement.  Moreover, as the absentee ballot remained sealed, there was no possibility of fraud.  Thus, the court affirmed the counting of Walter Daughenbaugh's absentee ballot and the tie-break election victory of David Piet.

 Braunlich, however, was not through.  She appealed the Allegheny Court of Common Pleas decision to the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court.

 Here is where things really get interesting.  The Commonwealth Court judge who decided the case was none other than Senior Judge Keith B. Quigley.

 In his decision (2357 CD 2009), Judge Quigley cited In re: Canvass of Absentee Ballots of 2003 and ruled accordingly:



"In In re of Absentee Ballots of November 4, 2003 General Election, 577 Pa. 231, 843 A.2d 1223 (2004), our supreme court held that in the context of the Election Code, the word “shall” carries a mandatory, not a discretionary meaning.  Under Section 1921(a) of the Statutory Construction Act, “[w]hen the words of a statute are clear and free from all ambiguity, the letter of it is not to be disregarded under the pretext of pursuing its spirit.”  1 Pa. C.S. §1921(a).  Therefore a court is forbidden from ignoring the clear mandates of the Election Code in pursuit of other considerations.  See In re Canvass of Absentee Ballots of November 4, 2003 General Election."  [Emphasis added.]

 Thus, Judge Quigley's strict interpretation of the mandatory nature of "shall" in the context of the Pennsylvania Election Code overturned an Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas decision which recognized the paramount importance of the franchise under Pennsylvania law, overturned the tie-break election of David Piet, and disenfranchised Walter Daughenbaugh by negating the vote he cast on an absentee ballot while in active duty military service to his country all because the opening of the sealed absentee ballot did not meet the mandatory "shall" requirement of being opened at the precinct.  Never mind that the ballot was found six days after the election was over and the precinct closed and Braunlich had decided not to challenge the ballot itself in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas, as she was given opportunity to do so by the court! 

 Although the arguments in the briefs in 215 MD 2013 and in 359 MD 2014 directly confronted Judge Quigley with his ruling in 2357 CD 2009 that "shall" is mandatory in the context of the Pennsylvania Election Code to the Draconian extent that even (in Quigley's view) the enfranchisement and intent of an elector must take a back seat, a review of the rulings in 215 MD 2013 and 359 MD 2014 demonstrates that Judge Quigley failed to address and completely ignored in his consideration of the cases the argument that "shall" is mandatory under the Pennsylvania Election Code as it pertains to the Voucher Request statute, which contains seven instances of "shall," including the provisions in law that vouchers "shall be retained" and "shall be available."

 Voucher Request statute from the PA Election Code:

25 P.S. § 3246 (c):  Vouchers or copies of vouchers for all sums expended amounting to more than twenty-five dollars ($25) shall be retained by the candidate or the committee treasurer and shall be available for public inspection and copying as herein provided. Any person may inspect or copy such vouchers or copies thereof by filing a written request with the appropriate supervisory office which shall notify the candidate or political committee of such request. The candidate or political committee shall have the option of either forwarding such vouchers or copy of the same to the supervisor for such purpose or making the vouchers or copy of the same available to the requesting person. If a candidate or a treasurer of a political committee shall fail to make said vouchers or copies thereof available for inspection and copying when requested by the appropriate supervisory officer, such officer shall direct the candidate or political committee to promptly deliver the vouchers or copies thereof to the supervisory office for purposes of inspection and copying. Costs of copying and costs of delivery by the candidate or treasurer of the requested vouchers or copies thereof shall be borne by the person requesting same.

 An aside: David Piet appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, but in 5 WAL 2010, the PA Supreme Court denied Piet's Petition for Allowance of Appeal and Daughenbaugh's Petition to Intervene.  Judge Quigley's ruling stood.

 In 2009, Senior Judge Keith B. Quigley so stringently interpreted the mandatory nature of "shall" in the context of the Pennsylvania Election Code that he overturned a lower court ruling, overturned an election, and disenfranchised an elector on active military duty service to his country.  

 A mere 4 and 5 years later, respectively, Judge Quigley ignored his ruling in 2357 CD 2009 on the mandatory nature of "shall" in the context of the Pennsylvania Election Code, allowed State Rep. Tim Mahoney's (D-51) Friends of Tim Mahoney campaign committee to keep secret the particulars of its expenditures (violating the mandatory requirement that the expense vouchers be made available for inspection and/or copying), and destroyed utterly the Voucher Request statute (i.e., an entire statute of Pennsylvania election law) thereby nullifying the intent of the Pennsylvania General Assembly that voucher requesters have the right to inspect and/or copy vouchers (i.e., receipted bills detailing the particulars of expenditures made by campaign committees to influence the outcome of elections in this commonwealth).  

 Of his own volition, Judge Quigley also granted the Application of the PA-DOS-BCEL to turn the unreported Memorandum Opinion into a reported Opinion that will be referred to as "case precedent" in Voucher Request cases. In other words, the BCEL will never make a failure determination as it pertains to campaign committee voucher submissions.  Campaign committees can submit whatever they want to submit or submit nothing at all, and voucher requesters, if they raise objection, will be pointed to the Quigley decision and its asinine, illogical ruling that the BCEL cannot make sufficiency determinations on campaign committee voucher submissions.

 Senior Judge Keith B. Quigley's election case rulings -- resulting in elector disenfranchisement, destruction of election law rights, and destruction of election law -- are models of inconsistency and perniciousness.

 Again, where are the state senators and state representatives working to rectify these egregious wrongs?
   

Grogan Graffam Attorney Ronald J. Brown Donates to Friends of Tim Mahoney

Posted: Friday, April 15, 2016 by Pezzonovante in Labels: , ,
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Page 10 of The Friends of Tim Mahoney Cycle 2 2016 campaign finance report shows that Attorney Ronald J. Brown of Grogan Graffam, P.C. -- who represented Republican co-objectors Robin Lynn (Guerriere) Amend and Thomas R. Murray II in the nominating petition challenges of State Rep. Tim Mahoney's then-Republican challengers in the 2012 primary, Uniontown businessmen Gary Gearing and Michael Cavanagh -- donated $500.00 to The Friends of Tim Mahoney campaign committee on 04/01/2016.

 Readers will recall that the Friends of Tim Mahoney failed to submit multiple vouchers (i.e., receipted bills that detail the particulars of campaign expenditures).

 Grogan Graffam, P.C. received a $5,000.00 payment on 02/22/2012 from the Friends of Tim Mahoney campaign committee.  This was on the very same day that Brown finalized both nominating petition challenges against Cavanagh and Gearing.

 In multiple challenges, Brown represented the Friends of Tim Mahoney in its tooth-and-nail fight to keep the particulars of the vouchers secret.

 Readers will recall the Voucher Request statute from the PA Election Code:

25 P.S. § 3246 (c):  Vouchers or copies of vouchers for all sums expended amounting to more than twenty-five dollars ($25) shall be retained by the candidate or the committee treasurer and shall be available for public inspection and copying as herein provided. Any person may inspect or copy such vouchers or copies thereof by filing a written request with the appropriate supervisory office which shall notify the candidate or political committee of such request. The candidate or political committee shall have the option of either forwarding such vouchers or copy of the same to the supervisor for such purpose or making the vouchers or copy of the same available to the requesting person. If a candidate or a treasurer of a political committee shall fail to make said vouchers or copies thereof available for inspection and copying when requested by the appropriate supervisory officer, such officer shall direct the candidate or political committee to promptly deliver the vouchers or copies thereof to the supervisory office for purposes of inspection and copying. Costs of copying and costs of delivery by the candidate or treasurer of the requested vouchers or copies thereof shall be borne by the person requesting same.

There are seven instances of "shall" in the statute, and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled in 2004 that "shall" has a mandatory, not discretionary meaning under the Election Code.


Yet, Senior Judge Keith B. Quigley -- who himself acknowledged the Pennsylvania Supreme Court case precedent on the meaning of "shall" in one former ruling (2357 CD 2009), and the stringency by which the Election Code must be followed in another order -- ruled (contra the law) that the Legislature did not provide the Secretary of the Commonwealth with the power to make sufficiency determinations regarding voucher submissions under the statute.

See the Fayette Searchlight blog article with the link to Judge Oler's putrid affirmation of the errant opinions in 215 MD 2013 and in 359 MD 2014 reached by Judge Quigley here:


Read carefully this section of above statute:  "If a candidate or a treasurer of a political committee shall fail to make said vouchers or copies thereof available for inspection and copying when requested by the appropriate supervisory officer, such officer shall direct the candidate or political committee to promptly deliver the vouchers or copies thereof to the supervisory office for purposes of inspection and copying."

Basic logic dictates that if the statute tasks the PA-DOS-BCEL with making failure determinations regarding committee voucher submissions, it first must make sufficiency determinations [i.e., one cannot make a failure determination without first making a sufficiency determination as to whether an actual voucher (i.e., a receipted bill for the expenditure showing the particulars of the expenditure)] has been submitted.

Rep. Timothy S. Mahoney's (D-51) Friends of Tim Mahoney campaign committee fought tooth-and-nail not to release its vouchers.

By the willful disregard of the PA Election Code by The Friends of Tim Mahoney and by its nefarious maneuvering -- along with the pernicious decision of a judge who contradicted PA Supreme Court case precedent (In re: Canvass of Absentee Ballots of 2003) and his own former ruling (2357 CD 2009) that cited it -- the Voucher Request statute was utterly destroyed.  With that destruction came the obliteration of the right of requesters (which right the PA General Assembly intended to provide) to see the particulars of campaign finance expenditures that influence the outcome of elections in this commonwealth.

 Thus, State Rep. Tim Mahoney's signature accomplishment during his tenure in the PA House is the destruction of any person's right to see the particulars of campaign finance expenditures which influence the outcome of elections in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

 It's a truly disgusting legacy.

 Where are the state representatives and state senators working to rectify this injustice and this travesty?






Fayette Tea Party Patriot FB Page Re-Posts False Propaganda on Heidi Cruz' "Dissent"

Posted: Wednesday, April 6, 2016 by Pezzonovante in Labels: , , , , , , ,
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With the 2016 races for president raging, an interesting Fayette Tea Party Patriots Facebook page post appeared on April 3.

 The post shared Carol Thomisee Despino's post about Heidi Cruz' and Donald Trump's association with the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).

 See:  https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10209533627563820&set=a.10206129685547397.1073741837.1420902307&type=3&theater.

 The post rightly highlights that Donald Trump, when asked to name his top national security/foreign policy advisors, listed Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, as one of his advisors.

 Regarding Heidi Cruz, the post states "Served a brief term as a conservative advisory member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Her sole contribution was a dissenting view on "Building a North American Community."

 The post goes on to state "SO TELL US AGAIN WHY TRUMP IS MORE ANTI-ESTABLISHMENT THAN CRUZ?"

 Obviously, the intent of the post is to say that Ted Cruz is more anti-Establishment than Donald Trump because Donald Trump names Haass as an advisor from whom he'd seek advice while Heidi Cruz "served a brief term as a conservative advisory member of the Council on Foreign Relations," with her sole contribution being "a dissenting view" on "Building a North American Community."

 As it pertains to Heidi Cruz, the post is an utter falsehood.  

 Heidi Cruz served on the CFR Task Force that produced the report "Building a North American Community."

 See:  http://www.cfr.org/canada/building-north-american-community/p8102.

 The above link includes Heidi Cruz' biography which reads as follows:

HEIDI S. CRUZ is an energy investment banker with Merrill Lynch in Houston, Texas. She served in the Bush White House under Dr. Condoleezza Rice as the Economic Director for the Western Hemisphere at the National Security Council, as the Director of the Latin America Office at the U.S. Treasury Department, and as Special Assistant to Ambassador Robert B. Zoellick, U.S. Trade Representative. Prior to government service, Ms. Cruz was an investment banker with J.P. Morgan in New York City.

 Beginning on Page 33 of the report, under the heading "Additional and Dissenting Views," Heid S. Cruz wrote the following:
I support the Task Force report and its recommendations aimed at
building a safer and more prosperous North America. Economic prosperity
and a world safe from terrorism and other security threats are
no doubt inextricably linked. While governments play an invaluable role in both regards, we must emphasize the imperative that economic
investment be led and perpetuated by the private sector. There is no
force proven like the market for aligning incentives, sourcing capital,
and producing results like financial markets and profit-making businesses.
This is simply necessary to sustain a higher living standard for
the poorest among us—truly the measure of our success. As such,
investment funds and financing mechanisms should be deemed attractive
instruments by those committing the capital and should only be developed
in conjunction with market participants.

 Heidi S. Cruz
[Emphasis added.]

 Heidi Cruz' "dissent" was really an additional view that market participants should make investment decisions, not a dissent.  She unequivocally supports the Task Force report, "Building a North American Community," and its recommendations.

 Here is the major recommendation from Page 3 of the report:
To that end, the Task Force proposes the creation by 2010 of
a  North American community to enhance security, prosperity, and
opportunity. We propose a community based on the principle affirmed
in the March 2005 Joint Statement of the three leaders that ‘‘our
security and prosperity are mutually dependent and complementary.’’
Its boundaries will be defined by a common external tariff and an outer
security perimeter within which the movement of people, products,
and capital will be legal, orderly, and safe. Its goal will be to guarantee
a free, secure, just, and prosperous North America.

 As the European Economic Community (EEC) morphed into what is now a supranational, political construct known as the European Union (EU), globalist elites like Heidi Cruz envision a North American Community with a "common external tariff and an outer security perimeter" (i.e., no internal borders) that will one day morph into a North American Union (NAU), a supranational political union where America, the U.S. Constitution, our liberties and our freedoms are obliterated and subsumed into the New World Order of George H.W. Bush's and George W. Bush's wet dreams.

 Recall that the Fayette Tea Party Patriots supported the "Thou Shalt Not Move" movement to keep a "Ten Commandments" monument on the grounds of the Connellsville High School.

 If the Fayette Tea Party Patriots Facebook poster who re-posted the disingenuous and utterly false post about Heidi Cruz' so-called "dissenting view" on "Building a North American Community" would consult those Ten Commandments, he'll find Number 9 of use.  Exodus 20:16 documents the Command:  "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour."