The Montana Supreme Court denied a request from Sandra Merchant and Cascade County to reverse the District Court’s decision to appoint an election monitor or assign a different monitor.

On June 13, the state court denied the request filed June 1 asking the higher court to take supervisory control over the lower court.

“Supervisory control is an extraordinary remedy that is sometimes justified when urgency or emergency factors exist making the normal appeal process inadequate, when the case involves purely legal questions, and when the other court is proceeding under a mistake of law and is causing a gross injustice, constitutional issues of state-wide importance are involved, or, in a criminal case, the other court has granted or denied a motion to substitute a judge,” the Supreme Court justices wrote in their June 13 order.

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“Merchant filed her petition on Friday afternoon, June 2, 2023. The election proceeded as scheduled the following Tuesday, June 6. Whatever urgent factors may have precipitated the filing of the petition, it appears those have passed with the conclusion of the election. We conclude that Merchant has not demonstrated grounds for this Court’s intervention in the pending case,” the justice’s wrote.

In her June 2 petition, Merchant continues the argument made in District Court in May that the lower court doesn’t have the authority to appoint a monitor and that Lynn Derorche, the court appointed monitor, is politically biased since she worked for Merchant’s predecessor Rina Fontana Moore.

Merchant defeated Moore for Cascade County clerk and recorder by 31 votes in November 2022.

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Deroche began working in the county elections office in 2006 and became the elections supervisor in 2013, under Moore.

In Merchant’s petition to the Montana Supreme Court, she argues that during her contested November 2022 election, “Fontana Moore’s role as election administrator for Cascade County and the operations of the elections office were the subject of continual public criticism by a relatively small group of registered voters who were supportive of Merchant. Merchant’s supporters included Devereau Biddick, who is now serving in the elections office as election specialist, and Julie Bass, whom Merchant has declared to be her chief election judge. During the contested election, Merchant’s supporters routinely criticized virtually every aspect of the former elections office’s operations including: the training provided to Election Judges, utilization of the ES&S machine, demands for Cast Vote Records which do not exist in Cascade County, demands for security camera footage, unsubstantiated allegations of voter fraud, asking to establish a physically monitored and video surveilled ballot box, staging viewers outside the Courthouse Annex (where the Cascade County elections office is located) after hours, photographing vehicles and license plates of vehicles parked at the Courthouse Annex, demanding access to the elections office during non-business hours, etc. This campaign attack was effective, both Fontana Moore and DeRoche’s election-related work were repeatedly painted as not only unethical and incompetent, but illegal.”

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Those claims stem from the affidavit of Carey Ann Haight, deputy county attorney, included with Merchant’s petition.

During the May 2 and June 6 elections, those opposed to Merchant’s handling of elections also questions the training process for election judges, requested video footage and public records, taking photos and videos in the office and of vehicles in the parking lot and observing the election process.

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Merchant’s office removed a long-standing ballot box at the front of the Courthouse Annex building, saying that was only for mail ballot elections.

The county denied requests for security camera footage during this year’s election and has not yet provided information requested by The Electric in April.

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In several instances, those working in Merchant’s office called law enforcement about the public observing the process.

One of those calls was around noon May 17 at the county office. That was the day the court ordered Merchant’s office to mail all absentee library levy ballots.

According to the Great Falls Police report, someone from the elections office called in as “someone yelling and chasing people around and filming them. Upon investigation it was determined the person who was supposed to be chasing and yelling at people was somebody that was cheering on the voting system. Witnesses on scene stated the complained of action didn’t happen how it was reported to dispatchers.”

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Merchant argues that Deroche was “an incredibly biased individual into the role as monitor to effectively spy on and publicly report about anything DeRoche personally views as inappropriate, a potential issue, or not to the former standards or procedures of DeRoche’s former employer Fontana Moore.”

In her petition, Merchant argues that Deroche was “effectively watching and condoning rather than providing any guidance or addressing actual issues she perceives as worthy of the court. For instance, DeRoche watched
individuals come to the counter, but nobody was apparently available and DeRoche made no effort to get somebody to the counter to assist the individual.”

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Several of Deroche’s reports detail suggestions she made to elections staff to address issues or questions by voters.

In her final report filed June 9, Deroche wrote, “since the two weeks of monitoring the process in the election office, communication between Sandra and myself was very minimal to none. I had more questions from the election staff than from Sandra. I was open to answering and helping with their process to running the ballots through the machine which was highly effective for them to complete their count. Overall, with having a poll election that saw roughly 300 in-person voters, I would say that election day ran smoothly with some minor office adjustments that could be taken under advisement.”

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In her petition, Merchant and Cascade County questioned whether a monitor was necessary and that the library board could just file with the court to request the court instruction Merchant to correct any issues.

“This court could simply require reporting to the Library on each step in the library election process, something that
Merchant was already doing, and if the library took issue with anything that was actually going to happen, the library could file a request with the court,” according to Merchant’s petition.

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The library board said in May that they were pursuing legal action in part due to a lack of communication from Merchant.

As of June 13, the library has not yet received an estimate of costs or invoice from Merchant’s office for the June 6 election.

As of June 12, the Great Falls Public Schools district had not yet received a invoice for their May 2 election, despite repeated requests for information, according to GFPS, which is trying to close their budget year by June 30.