Judge nearing decision on Liberal recount requests

Justice Alphonsus Faour will decide on Friday whether or not to proceed with a set of judicial recounts requested by the Liberals following October’s provincial election.

Three recounts have been requested by the Liberal candidates who ran in the districts of Placentia West-Bellevue, Topsail-Paradise and Lewisporte-Twillingate.

During the presentation of threshold arguments on Wednesday, Megan Reynolds, the lawyer representing three Liberal candidates Derek Bennett, Brian Keating and Dan Bobbett, raised alleged “inconsistencies” during the counting of special ballots.

According to the Supreme Court affidavits, the Liberal Party’s lead scrutineer Jeanette Fleming observed that some special ballots where voters circled a candidate's name instead of marking an X were counted, while other ballots were rejected.

Fleming also observed voters who wrote on the counterfoil of their special ballots were rejected by elections staff in some cases and accepted in others.

Based on Fleming's observations, Reynolds said some ballots were rejected that shouldn’t have been and other ballots were counted that should have been rejected.

Adrienne Ding, the lawyer representing the three PC MHAs-elect, Mark Butt, Jeff Dwyer and Paul Dinn, pushed back on Reynolds' argument.

She said Fleming's affidavit doesn’t present any legitimate inconsistencies in the three districts the Liberals are trying to contest.

Justice Faour reminded Reynolds twice on Wednesday that Fleming’s affidavit shows she only observed problems during the counting of votes in Lake Melville, Torngat Mountains and St. Barbe-L’Anse aux Meadows.

“The only example she gives us has nothing to do with the three ridings in question,” Ding said. “If a recount could be granted on the basis of this evidence, a recount could be obtained in any election.”

Reynolds maintained the judge could infer similar issues observed in Lake Melville, Torngat Mountains and St. Barbe-L’Anse aux Meadows may have affected results in the contested districts.

According to documents filed by Elections N.L., 453 people voted by special ballot in Lewisporte-Twillingate, 646 in Placentia West-Bellevue and 662 in Topsail-Paradise.

In another affidavit, a second Liberal scrutineer, Kaitlyn Hicks, noted inconsistencies during the counting of five polls on election day in Topsail-Paradise.

Ding said Hicks' claims were too vague.