CLEVELAND, OH – Justin Bibb’s September 14, 2021 pre-primary election campaign finance report was required pursuant to Section 3517.10 of the Ohio Revised Code to be delivered “not later than 4 p.m.” on the 12th day before the election. September 2, 2021 was the due date and Bibb’s campaign treasurer, Scott Hruby, delivered it on October 8, 2021.
Failing to file on time violates Section 3517.13 of the Ohio Revised Code. The heading is “failure to file.” Because they violated Section 3517.10 and 3517.13 of the Ohio Revised Code, Bibb and Hruby should have two separate 1st degree misdemeanor charges for just the “pre-primary election” campaign finance report. It’s a minimal of another two charges for each missed deadline afterwards and that’s not all.
Entering a public office that should have been declared “vacant” because of his disqualification, and filled in the manner spelled out by law, usurps a public office. Ohio’s General Assembly has offered us the “quo warranto” found at Section 2733 of the Ohio Revised Code as a tool to bring a civil action against a “usurper.” The quo warranto right is obstructed by the failed acts of election officials whose statutorily-required administrative trail of records is supposed to be complete and available to a plaintiff pursuant to the state’s open records laws.
Section 2733.01 is an unsuspended Ohio general law that has existed in the Revised Code since October 1, 1953. The heading is, “Proceedings against a person.”
A civil action in quo warranto may be brought in the name of the state: (A) Against a person who usurps, intrudes into, or unlawfully holds or exercises a public office, civil or military, or a franchise, within this state, or an office in a corporation created by the authority of this state; (B) Against a public officer, civil or military, who does or suffers an act which, by law, works a forfeiture of his office; (C) Against an association of persons who act as a corporation within this state without being legally incorporated.
When Hruby delivered the report 36 days after September 2, 2021, he and Bibb should have already been referred by Elections Manager Brent Lawler to the board; and by the board to Cuyahoga County Prosecuting Attorney Michael O’Malley. It was O’Malley’s duty to prosecute the 1st degree misdemeanor crime.
That’s what took place in Cuyahoga County in 1986 under late Prosecuting Attorney John T. Corrigan with Paul D. Mitchell. He filed 7 days after the 38th day past a general election and was referred and prosecuted. Late Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Judge Robert Feighan presided over the case and fined Mitchell $400. Fines today are $500 with no jail time.
By failing to prosecute elections board officials and candidates for violating any provision of Title 35, O’Malley is using the office to obstruct the “second conviction” provision of Section 3599.39 of the Ohio Revised Code. A Title 35 violating candidate can end up with two 1st degree misdemeanor violations or more before they appear on the ballot or take office. The state intended for voters to have the tools to get rid of criminaly-inclined candidate who disregard our laws before they enter an elected office with their organized crime gang.
If Bibb or any other candidate “failed to file” the four required reports no later than 4 p.m. on the 12th and 38th days before and after two elections, each violation counts as a separate offense. A second conviction jumps from a 1st degree misdemeanor to a 4th degree felony. A second conviction “disenfranchises” a candidate from seeking office. R.C. 3599.39 reads as follows:
Second conviction under election laws. Any person convicted of a violation of any provision of Title XXXV [35] of the Revised Code, who is again convicted of a violation of any such provision, whether such conviction is for the same offense or not, is on such second conviction guilty of a felony of the fourth degree, and in addition, shall be disfranchised.
If O’Malley had prosecuted Bibb for delivering his 36-day late pre-primary election report due on September 2nd, 36 days after the 12 day before the primary deadline and long after 4 p.m. on October 8th, he’d be on his second offense with his failure to deliver a report that was “90 percent accurate and complete” pursuant to Section 3517.11(C) of the Ohio Revised Code.
Ohio has tight election law standards the “curve graded” don’t even know exist. The General Assembly and Ohio’s Superintendent of Public Instruction should fucking “outlaw” curve grading as demeaning our state’s collective intelligence among our citizens aind inhabitants. Our students should not be taught to think “down” but to think “up.” An “A” is a score of 95 to 100 and anything less demeans us as Ohioans.
The instructions for Lawler and the board are found in Section 3517.11(C)(1) of the Ohio Revised Code. Before William Mason, Timothy McGinty and O’Malley held the prosecutor’s office these laws were obeyed.
(C)(1) In the event of a failure to file or a late filing of a statement required to be filed under sections 3517.081 to 3517.14 of the Revised Code, or if a filed statement or any addendum, amendment, or other correction to a statement or any amended statement, if an addendum, amendment, or other correction or an amended statement is required to be filed, is incomplete or inaccurate or appears to disclose a failure to comply with or a violation of law, the official whose duty it is to examine the statement shall promptly file a complaint with the Ohio elections commission under section 3517.153 of the Revised Code if the law is one over which the commission has jurisdiction to hear complaints, or the official shall promptly report the failure or violation to the board of elections and the board shall promptly report it to the prosecuting attorney in accordance with division (J) of section 3501.11 of the Revised Code.
The missed deadline prevented Bibb in his candidate’s official capacity from entering the “office” of a primary election candidate pursuant to Section 3517.11(D). The elections board was restricted by the same law from issuing him a certificate of nomination or election.
Bibb, according to the statute, was supposed to “not enter upon the performance of the duties” of the office on his own irrespective of the election board or its employees’ criminal acts of misconduct. He has a law school education so he knows the use of the word “shall” imposes a mandatory duty upon the official it instructs to obey the language of the statute as written. In law school he learned “statutory construction.”
“No certificate of nomination or election shall be issued to a person, and no person elected to an office shall enter upon the performance of the duties of that office, until that person or that person’s campaign committee, as appropriate, has fully complied with this section and sections 3517.08, 3517.081, 3517.10, and 3517.13 of the Revised Code.”
The campaign filing requirements give voters an opportunity to see who spent money with the candidate and how they spent it, with receipts or other supporting documentation, before the election. They also exist as tools voters (like me) can use to learn if a candidate has obeyed basic campaign finance reporting laws. It allows the knowing to evaluate the level of misconduct elections board officials engage in to aid a non-compliant candidate. The knowing also use it as a tool to evaluate the prosecuting attorney’s conduct in office to identify abuse of authority and uneven enforcement of laws.
Reporters, regretably, have been trained to look at the cash and names in a campaign finance report. They don’t know to look at the dates of filing or even “how” to review the contributions for the conflicts that exist; or the documents that are required to be created along with “receipts” of expenditures. A reporter who hasn’t read, and is not knowledgeable of all of Title 35, is not qualified to cover political campaigns or to examine the quality of the elected officials they produce.
Had Bibb not entered the office of a primary election candidate after failing to file on September 2, as Section 3517.11(D) instructed him, the primary election results on September 14th would have been radically different. Imagine these unobservably obstructive acts in federal elections and then think about former President Donald Trump’s claim that his was stolen. Had Bibb been disqualified and both Kevin Kelley and Dennis Kucinich met their campaign reporting requirements, they’d have faced each other in November; or perhaps more of Bibb’s votes would have gone to Zack Reed, Basheer Jones or Sandra Williams.
Cuyahoga County is also the only county with a former prosecuting attorney, Mason, who used the office to operate a campaign printing and political marketing business with Thomas E. Day, Jr’s Qwestcom and Victory Communication, Inc. What federal prosecutors and FBI agents should find offensive is that a state prosecuting attorney operated a campaign consulting service out of the prosecutors office; and tacitly offered zero enforcement of federal and state election laws as a package deal to his winning clients.
Every candidate who has found themselves faced with an Ohio Elections Commission referral has been treated “disparately” and “under the color of law.” Board members and “inspecting” campaign officials could “interpret” laws far beyond the limits of Title 35, or target the candidates they chose for referal, knowing Mason, McGinty and O’Malley were covering for them.
In 2013 I identified 65 candidates who had failed to file campaign finance reports on the 12th day before and the 38th day after an election. The violations occurred under Jane Platten as director, Pat McDonald as deputy director and Lawler as the elections manager. Attorneys Inajo Chappelle Davis and Jeffrey Hastings had been alternating as board chairperson. McGinty served as the prosecuting attorney and he’d hired Platten to serve as his chief of staff before my revelations. Every violator in office was evidence of the racketeering level obstruction of Title 35 taking place between the elections board and the prosecuting attorney’s office.
Cleveland Council President-elect Blaine Griffin served as the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party’s vice chairman when I exposed the 65 violators of R.C. 3517.11(D). He told me then that the “clean up” acts the election board was engaging in served as an admission that Title 35’s unsuspended statutes were violated. He warned that McGinty, however, would not prosecute 65 elected officials like Judge John O’Donnell; who had campaigned twice and served two six year terms without filing any campaign finance reports between 2002 and January 22, 2014. Griffin said internal discussions inside the parties whose office holders should have been removed and criminally prosecuted, was that the repercussions were too far reaching.
O’Donnell “entered” the office of judge, twice, and discharged the duties of the office over thousands of trials without Lawler ever reporting him to the board; and the board reporting him to the prosecuting attorney. There’s one “withdrawn” referral to the Ohio Elections Commission and no physical evidence in the form of the required Revised Code 3517.11(D) notices in his campaign files.
In Bibb’s case what’s not in the online records is the evidence that double-dipping Lawler reported Bibb and Hruby’s September 2, 2021 pre-primary election “failure to file” to the board; and the board reported it to the county prosecutor. The board’s agenda and meetings between September 13 and November 18th do not show any referals to the board or prosecutor for “known” violators of R.C. 3517.10, 3517.11 and 3517.13.
By entering the office and impersonating an elected official who had complied with Section 3517.10, 3517.11 and 3517.13, O’Donnell obstructed Ohio governors from appointing his replacement to the office that should have been declared “vacant” and filled in the manner required by law. The Americans who thought he was a statutorily-compliant constitutional officer of the court, especially during Michael Brelo’s trial, should have had their cases reviewed and dismissed.
Those he sentenced should have witnessed O’Donnell’s criminal prosecution for his knowing usurpation of an elected “judicial” office. Instead of presenting a trial in front of O’Donnell, it was McGinty’s duty to criminally prosecute him for the election law violations and his theft of an elected office, a public paycheck and a pension. A second conviction for his known Title 35 violations would have disenfranchised O’Donnell before he ever got to the Brelo trial.
The board’s failure to enforce R.C. 3517.11 in its entirety, and as written, would have forced courts to void every act people who had no legal authority to discharge the duties of an elected office committed. It makes every public dime they received a theft; and their presence an impersonation of an elected official. Even now Sunny Simon serves on the Cuyahoga County council as a District 11 representative unlawfully.
Simon was a candidate in the November 6, 2018 general election. Her pre-general election report was due 12 days earlier on October 25th no later than 4 p.m. Simon’s post-general election report was due at no later than 4 p.m. on December 14, 2018. Like Bibb she was prohibited by R.C. 3517.11(D) from entering the office of a Cuyahoga County Council member. Like Bibb the elections manager should have referred her to the board and the board to O’Malley the prosector.
Simon served as her own treasurer. She filed her pre-primary election, post-primary election and pre-general election campaign finance reports, including an amendment, on February 10, 2021. Simon missed the not later than 4 p.m. on the 12th day before mark for her pre-general election report by 839 days.
There’s no referal to the board or the prosecutor as required in Section 3517.11(C) of the Ohio Revised Code. O’Malley won’t see how the board’s obstruction is making him appear to outside federal authorities who are more than curious about his relationship with Mason and Armond Budish. What he should not be doing is seeking re-election as Cuyahoga County’s prosecuting attorney in 2022.
