Bryan Blehm, an attorney for We The People AZ Alliance, on Monday filed a Special Action Complaint against Runbeck Election Services and Maricopa County for public records relating to chain of custody and video documentation of ballot receipts at the Runbeck facility.
Roughly 81% of the 1,311,734 Maricopa County 2022 election voters voted by mail and had their ballot sent to Runbeck for signature verification with discrepancies in ballot chain of custody documentation.
The Gateway Pundit recently reported that the Arizona Supreme Court issued a ruling in Kari Lake’s lawsuit, confirming a previous mandate for the trial court and issuing bogus, meaningless sanctions for Lake’s attorneys over their factual claims regarding chain of custody. Still, the Court denied Defendants’ attorneys’ fees, and the sanction for just $2,000 to the Court was a joke.
The issue that Kari Lake was sanctioned on relates to the missing documentation of over 35,000 ballots sent between Runbeck’s warehouse and Maricopa County. The record supported the claims by Lake; the Arizona Supreme Court just ignored Lake’s argument and the math.
The Gateway Pundit reported that We The People AZ Alliance would be filing a lawsuit with one of Lake’s attorneys after Maricopa County and Runbeck Election Services denied lawful public records requests for footage at Runbeck’s facility. These records could prove that 35,563 illegal ballots were added to the count.
We The People AZ Alliance is requesting the “exterior video of all loading dock locations, which clearly shows any items being delivered and/or “picked up” and “interior video of all loading dock locations/warehouse space which clearly shows any items) being delivered and/or picked up” at Runbeck after Election Day.
Runbeck previously denied this request, claiming they have “no legal obligation to do so.” Runbeck’s liberal hack attorney is also the same attorney who represented Katie Hobbs in Lake’s lawsuit.
However, Runbeck, despite being a private company, is the custodian of these records and must comply with Arizona’s Public Records Law based on established case law in the Arizona Court of Appeals during a lawsuit by Phoenix Newspapers, Inc. against Cyber Ninjas and the Arizona Senate during the 2020 Election Audit. Therefore, We The People AZ Alliance can sue Runbeck and Maricopa County under the same pretenses that Cyber Ninjas was sued for denying a public records request.
From the Arizona Court of Appeals:
To the extent Cyber Ninjas is in sole possession of audit- related public records because of its contract with the Senate, Cyber Ninjas has become the custodian of those records under [Arizona’s Public Records Law] the PRL. And as to those records, Cyber Ninjas has assumed the obligations the PRL assigns to a “custodian” of public records. Under the PRL, a person seeking publicrecords must make its request to the “custodian” of the records. A.R.S. § 39-121.01(D)(1). “Access to a public record is deemed denied if a custodian fails to promptly respond to a request for production of a public record.” A.R.S. § 39-121.01(E).
From Bryan Blehm’s letter threatening legal action and the new lawsuit against Maricopa County and Runbeck collectively:
To the extent [Runbeck] is in sole possession of [election]-related public records because of its contract with [Maricopa County], [Runbeck] has become the custodian of those records under the PRL. And as to those records, [Runbeck] has assumed the obligations the PRL assigns to a “custodian” of public records. Under the PRL, a person seeking public records must make its request to the “custodian” of the records. A.R.S. § 39-121.01 (D)(1). “Access to a public record is deemed denied if a custodian fails to promptly respond to a request for production of a public record.” A.R.S. § 39-121.01(E).
The complaint also notes that “Stephen Richer, the Maricopa County Recorder, routinely points out to the public the open nature of Arizona elections by tweeting about a comparable on-line video of all election related activity at Maricopa County Tabulation Center.”
However, what occurs at Runbeck, a private third party that plays an “extraordinary role in Maricopa County elections,” is a mystery.
“Defendant Runbeck also brags about its state-of-the-art video surveillance of all aspects of its election related activities” but “provides no publicly available live feeds of its election related activities,” attorney Bryan Blehm continues.
Read the full Special Action Complaint and exhibits below:
CV2023-051714 VerCmplnt by Jordan Conradson on Scribd
Cv2023-051714 Vercmplnt Exhibits by Jordan Conradson on Scribd