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UPDATED 1/26 5:48 p.m.: Convicted of 23 felonies for computer crimes(1), Jeffrey Dean was sent to prison for four years. Shortly after his release from incarceration, his company was awarded a massive ballot printing contract. In a 2003 deposition, Dean says he was a scapegoat(2), left holding the bag in a series of unapproved payments from the politically connected Culp, Guterson & Grader law firm. One of this firm's partners at the time was Egil "Bud" Krogh, who headed the White House "plumbers" unit under Richard Nixon. Krogh, who was made a partner of Culp Guterson & Grader in 1984, ordered a burglary of private documents from Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg during the Nixon administration.(3) During an investigation of Dean's assets in unrelated litigation (2003),(4) he claimed that other persons from Culp Guterson & Grader were involved in a scheme,(5) and upon discovery of illicit payments (averaging $14,000/month)(6) he was made to take the blame. Jeffrey Dean has told many conflicting stories about his legal troubles, and we are unaware of any evidence that anyone at Culp Guterson & Grader was in fact involved. Black Box Voting is looking into Dean's circle of contacts because of his meteoric rise as an insider in U.S. elections immediately after getting out of prison -- gaining lucrative government contracts from King County (WA) and British Columbia that would certainly be facilitated by political clout. One of the characters in Dean's perimeter was Bud Krogh. He was made partner of Culp, Guterson & Grader in 1984 -- some accounts say 1980 -- and reportedly became a managing partner of the firm at some point. The period while Dean was receiving illicit payments was 1985 through 1987. Like Jeffrey Dean, Krogh did time in prison -- four months for Watergate-related crimes. He was disbarred, but after a fight from a Culp Guterson & Grader attorney, his credentials were restored. At the time, the firm was called "Culp Dwyer Guterson & Grader." Black Box Voting is not aware of any evidence that Krogh managed Jeffrey Dean or that he has been involved in anything inappropriate since Watergate, however. 'He was hired on the merits of his character, intelligence and skills as a lawyer,'' said William L. Dwyer, the firm's senior partner, who had represented Mr. Krogh in his disbarment fight. Dwyer became a U.S. district judge. (According to the New York Times, July 13, 1986 "The Success of the President's Men")
Another attorney for King County-based Culp Guterson & Grader was a former King County deputy prosecutor and had been legal counsel for a King County mayor. With such egregious infractions against a politically connected King County firm, it is surprising that an embezzler of Culp Guterson & Grader would become a key insider for the King County ballot printing, absentee handling and voting system programming -- especially since Culp Guterson & Grader was seeking restitution from him at the time.
This would be a comedy if it wasn't so serious: While the King County prosecutor was supposedly seeking Jeffrey Dean for failure to make restitution, Dean was working in the same building programming voting systems. One wonders how often Dean shared the elevator with those who were seeking him, and why no one at Culp Guterson & Grader nudged any of their friends in King County politics to go take a look at the 1992 Seattle Times article about Jeffrey Dean's conviction on 23 counts of theft.
DEAN BECOMES A BALLOT PRINTER
Jeffrey Dean was released from prison in Aug. 1995. Not long afterward, a company owned by his wife (but run by Jeffrey Dean) was awarded a massive ballot-printing contract and lucrative election-programming deals that ultimately made the Deans millionaires. In SEC documents, this company (Spectrum Print & Mail Ltd.) lists assets located in the Seattle area, British Columbia, San Francisco and in the Norwalk (CA) location that houses the Los Angeles County Elections Division.(7)
DEAN DEVELOPS COMPUTERIZED ELECTION SYSTEMS
According to depositions taken in 2003, Jeffrey Dean programmed the ballot sorting software used to process incoming and outgoing mail-in ballots; he also developed the Vote Remote software used to track and authenticate mail-in ballots.
Key logs from King County Elections show that Jeffrey Dean was given intimate access to the GEMS server (Diebold central tabulating software); internal memos from Diebold refer to an ongoing consulting arrangement with Dean, and document that he had management involvement in the touch-screens, the 1.96 version of the optical scan, the votercard encoder and the Windows CE operating system used in Diebold voting machines. In addition, during recent litigation Dean called Peter G. Martin as a witness, indicating that he had worked closely with Martin, who programmed the new upcoming High Speed Central Count system.
Diebold's mail-in voting system warrants far more scrutiny than it's getting. Recent information obtained by Black Box Voting shows that Diebold has now stripped out security protections that previously existed in the firmware that counts and creates the absentee ballot audit trail.
RECENT DEVELOPMENTS WITH THE DEAN FAMILY
Black Box Voting has learned that in Dec. 2005 Jeffrey Dean and his wife Deborah were ordered into Chapter 7 bankruptcy by a trustee who become fed up with their "gamesmanship" in obstructing discovery of their assets. Jeffrey and Deborah Dean had attempted to reorganize their assets under Chapter 11, and Chapter 13, filed separately from one another and frequently attempting to change the status (i.e. from Chapter 11 to Chapter 13 for one spouse, with a different category for the other).
In addition to a court order to pay past-due restitution to Culp, Guterson & Grader (over $600,000), they were ordered to pay $500,000 to Tae Yon Kim, a former programmer who they fired just days after the 2000 election.
The Deans had lost or fired nearly all of their programmers shortly before and after the 2000 election. One of their programmers, Brian Clubb, came back to work for that division under Diebold.
It is curious that the Deans chose to file for bankruptcy at all (even Chapter 13 and/or Chapter 11, which allow reorganization of assets rather than the total liquidation required by Chapter 7). The Deans have now paid the Culp Guterson & Grader judgment. They still would have had over $2 million in assets to pay the Tae Yon Kim judgement. Instead, they transferred $1.8 million to family members (which may ultimately be deemed to be a fraudulent transfer); they obstructed production of various records, and have still not fully accounted for or explained their income stream, which includes murky "$8000 per quarter" payments from an entity they call "Spectrum Digital" in British Columbia.
Spectrum Digital does not appear to be registered in British Columbia, and following its address in the phone book leads to a house in a posh residential area. Spectrum has never applied for a business license in Maple Ridge, where the Deans say it is located.
There was once a Spectrum Print & Mail in Burnaby, B.C. (which was owned by the Deans), but that was sold to Global Election Systems in 2000. The Canadian business for that operation, as reported to Global Election Systems by the Deans, was "printing and other services" for ICBC, a quasi-public auto insurance company. ICBC, the firm that prints all the drivers licenses in B.C., revealed to Black Box Voting that the annual contractual payments to Spectrum Print & Mail were about $540,000. However, only half that amount appears on the Spectrum financial statements provided to Global by the Deans. Global Election Systems purchased the British Columbia operations for Spectrum Print & Mail, including the ICBC contract. Thus, the "Spectrum" in the house in Maple Ridge, which has been sending money to the Deans, appears to be a new or different Spectrum, and it is unclear what its business operation does or where its printing presses would be located.
Black Box Voting called the only "Spectrum Digital" listed in British Columbia, a map-printing firm. The owners were also curious about the Maple Ridge operation, and reported to BBV's Kathleen Wynne that they began getting phone calls for another "Spectrum Digital." Curious, they drove to Maple Ridge (locally referred to as "Haney"), but found no Spectrum operation. They were under the impression that it suddenly shut down. In fact, Black Box Voting has been unable to confirm that there was ever a physical address for any Spectrum or Spectrum Digital other than a residence (except the unrelated map-printing company).
Depositions of Deborah Dean in Oct. 2004 are quite vague about the income from the Canadian "Spectrum" operation, run by a former employee of the Deans, Erica Cardas. Ms. Dean seemed unable to remember whether, when she handed over $45,000 to Cardas, it was a loan or not; she was unsure whether she (Dean) was a director of the Spectrum in Canada. Ms. Dean also claimed to be unsure of how many bank accounts were held by yet another "Spectrum" -- this one owned by the Deans and, by gifts of money or stock, their sons. This entity is a Delaware corporation called "Spectrum NW." Deborah Dean claimed in depositions that she did not know how much money was in Spectrum NW accounts, because "Jeff does the books." At the time, Jeff was again incarcerated, on a parole violation.
The husband of the Canadian "Spectrum" owner, Mark Cardas, was using the e-mail address of the Dean's current U.S.-based Spectrum NW as his realtor e-mail. When asked what the purpose of Spectrum NW is, the Deans say it is doing land development. They purchased 750 acres in Idaho and an RV Park. One of the depositions states that work was done to create computer network connections between "Spectrum NW," "Spectrum Digital" and the Idaho ranch.
The Deans at one point stated that they have had no ongoing relationship with Diebold, but when asked in a formal interrogatory to reveal all past and current payments from Diebold, and any due in the future, they ommitted that answer.
In Jan. 2005, the courts ordered Deborah Dean to produce documents or face jail time. In December 2005, a trustee merged the husband and wife Jeffrey and Deborah Dean's bankruptcy cases together, putting the merged case under Chapter 7 bankruptcy requirements which gives the trustee more control over their estate.
A 25 YEAR HISTORY OF TROUBLE
Jeffrey Dean has a 25-year history of financial problems, tax liens and litigation, going back to a company he formed while working for Boeing. Though he refers to this company in recent depositions as "Astec," its real name was Advanced Systems Technology, Inc., a company run by Dean and partner Michael C. Redman. Dean represents that this company did aircraft design, and says that he sold it to Raleigh-Durham Aviation in 1980. Legal documents show that he had a $700,000 tax lien imposed on him in connection with the "failed business" in 1984, and several creditors filed civil suits against him in 1979 and 1980.
By 1982, Dean was a contractor for Culp, Guterson & Grader. Assets began accumulating under his wifes' names. When Dean divorced his first wife and married wife #2, Lorimay, she began accumulating real estate under an entity called "JAL Investments Inc." This entity and its real estate was transferred to Dean's third wife, Deborah M. Dean. Culp, Guterson & Grader represented Dean in both of his divorces (1982 and 1984).
Efforts to shield assets through Jeff Dean's wife failed when it was revealed that over $180,000 of inappropriately received funds were spent on Deborah Dean's house, and that Deborah had been cashing checks as large as $10,000 at a time from the illicit funds.
Although she was involved in litigation over restitution issues, Deborah Dean was not prosecuted in the thefts from Culp, Guterson & Grader.
Jeffrey Dean entered an Alford Plea admitting to 23 felony counts, and was ordered to appear at the Shelton Correctional facility to begin his incarceration. Instead, he failed to show up and went to Oregon, where he apparently lived under a different name. Bench warrants were issued and he went to prison.
Meanwhile, wife Deborah began "Spectrum Print & Mail Ltd." According to depositions, this firm was mostly delivering newspapers to contract deals like the Washington ferries.
Shortly after Jeffrey Dean got out of prison, however, Spectrum Print & Mail got into ballot printing and designing software for elections.
This ballot printing plant, using software Dean claims to have developed, handles ballot printing and mail-ballot processing for counties like King County (WA) and Los Angeles County, Fresno County, San Diego County, Alameda County (CA), and for the state of Georgia and many other locations.
The Deans were rewarded for Jeffrey Dean's ballot printing and election software programming work in a $4 million buyout by Global Election Systems shortly before election 2000. The Deans became the largest stockholders of Global Election Systems, and Jeffrey Dean took a position on the board of directors.
In January 2002, Diebold Inc. purchased Global Election Systems. Oddly, in a 2003 deposition, Jeffrey Dean claims that his contact with Global was always Pat Green -- but Green is a Diebold employee, not a Global Election Systems employee. Yet Diebold claims it hasn't worked with Jeffrey Dean.
The Dean's ballot printing company was acquired by Diebold in the Global Election Systems acquisition.
WHY ARE WE DOING THIS?
The Vote Remote software and the absentee ballot processing software developed by Jeffrey Dean was never submitted for certification, has not been examined by anyone, and due to technicalities in the certification regulations, is not subject to certification. Several counties have recently announced plans to force voters into all mail-in voting, including King County, Jeffrey Dean's first elections client.
Exactly what Jeffrey Dean was doing to the GEMS database program, what "oversight" he was providing to the touch-screen technology purchased by Diebold, and what expertise he provided for the votercard encoder, the optical scan 1.96 series, and the upcoming High Speed Central Count are not publicly known at this time.
DIEBOLD CLAIMS MERIT FURTHER SCRUTINY
Diebold claims that it did not work with Jeffrey Dean after acquiring Global Election Systems in 2002. However, the Dean depositions reveal that in May and June 2002, during the time the "rob-georgia" patch was created, Jeffrey Dean was called back to do consulting for Diebold. The Deans have been accused of obstructiveness and evasion by attorneys seeking to recover funds in a pending bankruptcy case. Specifically, when asked to identify monies paid by or due from Diebold Election Systems, they omitted answers.
YA'LL COME BACK NOW: DOCUMENTATION GOING UP SHORTLY
Depositions, documents, and supporting documentation will be posted on the Black Box Voting Web site this week. These documents include bankruptcy papers, depositions, civil litigation, criminal litigation, SEC filings, and information received from Canada.
Jeffrey Dean prison records: http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/2197/14323.html
(by Black Box Voting investigators Bev Harris, Kathleen Wynne, and Jim March, with assistance from Black Box Voting members Pat Vesely and John Howard.)
Citizen research & investigations section now available: http://www.bbvforums.org/cgi-bin/forums/board-auth.cgi?file=/17141/17141.html (you must register and log in to use this)
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