My comments follow the article.
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Miami Herald
Defeated judicial candidate sues Broward elections chief
By Todd Wright
December 29, 2009
A candidate who lost a bid for a Broward judgeship has filed a legal claim seeking to force elections chief Brenda Snipes to pay for her failed campaign.
Mardi Anne Levey, who won a legal battle just to make the November race, claims Snipes' decision to print ballots without her name confused voters and cost her the election.
Instead of seeing Levey's name, voters were supposed to be instructed at the polls that a vote for outgoing Circuit Judge Pedro Dijols was actually a vote for Levey.
Several voters in different locations complained of not seeing the signs with the special instructions, which were required to be posted at each voting booth, Levey said.
''My own college roommate didn't vote for me because she said she didn't see my name on her ballot,'' she said. ``I am trying to get back what I'm owed. The voters never saw my name.''
Levey's recent complaint is an addition to a lawsuit she filed against Snipes before the election to force the elections chief to put her name on the ballot. Levey is seeking about $14,000 and also wants the judge to hold Snipes in contempt for not posting signs on all the voting stations.
Included in the $14,000 is Levey's $6,000 filing fee -- part of which was to go toward printing her name on ballots -- and campaigning expenses.
Snipes is on vacation this week and could not respond to the allegations, elections spokeswoman Mary Cooney said.
Earlier in December, Levey had a filed a complaint with the state Elections Commission, but the claims were deemed unfounded, Cooney said.
Levey's recent legal maneuver adds the latest twist to the complex web of lawsuits that added fireworks to a usually tame judicial election season.
In August, Levey and eventual winner Bernard Bober bested Dijols in the general election. A week later, Dijols filed a lawsuit that argued Levey should be booted off the ballot because she ran under a name that she did not use in her legal practice.
Levey, who is married to Broward Judge Dale Cohen, said she did not use her married name because she did not want to be viewed as riding his coattails.
Dijols' victory in court was overturned on appeal, and Levey won the right to have her name printed on the ballot. But Snipes told the judge it would have been too costly to print new ballots with Levey's name on them.
Instead, Snipes was ordered to post bulletins in each voting station explaining how a voter could cast a ballot for Levey despite not seeing her name.
Levey said she spent close to $8,000 in campaign money to explain to supporters how to vote for her.
In November, Bober easily defeated Levey in the run off.
In the days after the race, Levey said she was not going to protest her defeat because it would cost taxpayers if she called for a special election.
Instead, she has filed an amendment to her suit.
''Her negligence cost me the election,'' she said.
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One of those clever comments was mine from that afternoon, after having previously discussed the matter with some friends who first told me they'd heard she was suing Dr. Snipes:
Dear Name-changing Judicial Candidate: If you have such poor inter-personal and communication skills that you weren't ever able to adequately explain your particular "situation" to your former college roommate, so that she'd vote for you, you are obviously NOT someone with enough common sense or eye for detail to be judge, since both are important qualities in a fair and well-respected judge.
Your lack of attention to detail is best reflected in the fact that as of last Friday, your eyesore of a campaign sign was still on the NE corner of State Road A1A and Hallandale Beach Blvd., more than seven weeks after the election was over. That speaks volumes.
Dave at Hallandale Beach Blog.
To that comment, I can now add the following one, since in the two weeks since I originally wrote that, I've been over on A1A and the North Beach area about six separate times.
That includes some pit-stops on my way up to the Westin Diplomat Resort and Spa when the Virginia Tech Hokies and the Florida Gators were there the past two weeks for their Bowl games. (Photos upcoming.)
One guess what was STILL there, on the fence fronting the area that's technically in the City of Hollywood, the future home of the Beach One Resort hotel? Correct.
The campaign sign of Name-changing Judicial Candidate Mardi Anne Levey Cohen.
According to a new post I first saw Saturday morning at former Sun-Sentinel political writer
Buddy Nevins' blog, BrowardBeat.com,
she's already filed to run again, this time against an incumbent judge who is a colleague of her
husband's at the courthouse.
Frankly, I think my prior criticisms of her seem more germane than ever, don't you think?
Broward County voters are just NOT that into you.
Bernard Bober was an excellent candidate and defeated you handily, 371,429 to 131,915, a
margin of almost 3-1.
I'm very intuitive, and I have to tell you, in all seriousness, I'm picking up some bad, bad vibrations as I get closer to the beach and the trio of condo towers that is The Beach Club at A1A and Hallandale Beach Blvd. Really.January 9, 2009 photo by South Beach Hoosier
Orange you glad to see me?No, I'm not. Not even from a distance of a block away.
Your Fifteen Minutes is up.
Why won't you go away, nine weeks after the election?
January 9, 2009 photo by South Beach Hoosier
Déjà vu all over again.
Above, Name-changing Judicial Candidate Mardi Anne Levey Cohen's campaign sign, shot
from the west sidewalk across A1A, in front of the 7-11.
January 9, 2009 photo by South Beach Hoosier
That's "bubble," not Michael Bublé.January 9, 2009 photo by South Beach Hoosier
For the story on how things got to the absurd point above, see the following:
September 30, 2008 Mardi Anne Levey knows it's all in the name
October 9, 2008 Mardi Anne Levey's bid for Broward judge upheld
December 20, 2008 Loser in Broward County judicial race sues elections chief
January 8, 2009
November election cost double what Snipes expected
I'm very intuitive, and I have to tell you, in all seriousness, I'm picking up some bad, bad vibrations as I get closer to the beach and the trio of condo towers that is The Beach Club at A1A and Hallandale Beach Blvd. Really.
Orange you glad to see me?
That's "bubble," not Michael Bublé.