Judge again refuses to grant losing candidates' request
Published: January 16, 2013
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ST. THOMAS - The five former candidates who are challenging the validity of the territory's 2012 election suffered another setback Monday.
District Judge Raymond Finch issued an order Monday, the same day the 30th Legislature was sworn in to office, denying the candidates' request that Finch reconsider his previous rejection of their petition for a temporary restraining order to halt the swearing-in of the election cycle's successful candidates.
"Plaintiffs have cited no intervening change in the controlling law or any new evidence that was not previously available as grounds for their motion for reconsideration," Finch wrote.
Finch initially denied the request Jan. 6, ruling that the plaintiffs had not provided sufficient evidence to show how they would be irreparably harmed by the swearing-in.
The plaintiffs' motion for reconsideration argued, in part, that Finch overlooked an element of their complaint seeking decertification of the 2012 election results based on a violation of V.I. Act 7334, which requires that only electronic voting machines certified by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission be used in the territory's elections.
Finch ruled Monday that the motion for reconsideration still failed to provide facts "elucidating how they were irreparably harmed, and how the Court may have missed facts in denying their application for a TRO."
No further hearings had been scheduled in the case as of Tuesday night.
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