A citizen removed from Wednesday’s Luzerne County Election Board meeting has been charged with simple assault, disrupting a meeting and other alleged offenses by the county sheriff’s department.
The citizen, 68-year-old Plains Township resident Joe Granteed, regularly attends election board meetings and had repeatedly threatened litigation against the county Wednesday as he was taken out by sheriff deputies.
The criminal complaint alleges the following:
At approximately 7 p.m. Wednesday, Granteed spoke at the podium during public comment about his belief that the county should only use paper ballots in elections and then “began to verbally attack the members of the Luzerne County Board of Elections, stating that they should be removed and that the board’s existence is unconstitutional.”
When his allocated three minutes for speaking expired, he continued to speak “and became increasingly disruptive.”
“As the defendant was returning to his seat, he continued to verbally assault the election board members, singling out Member Rick Morelli. Election Board Chairwoman Christine Boyle continuously told the defendant to take a seat and keep quiet.”
It said the defendant refused.
Sheriff Deputy Jerry DeHaza approached Granteed and “attempted to calm him down, but he continued to act out and stated that Deputy DeHaza did not have any authority to remove anyone from the meeting.”
DeHaza continued the attempts and unsuccessfully gave him several verbal commands to exit the courthouse.
Corporal Wanda Babula arrived and conferred with DeHaza, while Deputy Ryan Morgans remained in the meeting room.
Babula and DeHaza returned to Granteed, and both issued verbal commands to leave the courthouse, and Granteed refused.
Babula attempted to gather Granteed’s belongings on the chair next to him, and Granteed stated she could not touch his belongings and “swatted her hands away.”
“This prompted Deputy DeHaza to attempt to gain control of the defendant by taking a hold of the defendant’s right arm. The defendant pushed Deputy DeHaza away by striking Deputy DeHaza in the right shoulder with his left hand and left abdomen with his right hand,” it said.
While Morgans was attempting to gain control of Granteed’s left arm, Granteed “swiped his arm away from Deputy Morgans and again struck Deputy DeHaza in the right shoulder with his left hand.”
Granteed continued to state the deputies did not have the authority to remove him and that his First Amendment rights were being violated.
County Manager Romilda Crocamo told Granteed the deputies absolutely had the authority to remove him.
“The defendant continued to flail his body trying to break away” as DeHaza and Babula gained control of Granteed’s right arm and Morgans controlled his left arm. DeHaza and Morgans lifted Granteed from the chair and removed him from the meeting room with assistance from Babula.
Granteed was escorted to the elevator and then “calmed down and finally stopped his flailing,” prompting DeHaza and Morgans to release their hold on Granteed.
The deputies provided their names to Granteed at his request. He stated he was injured but left the courthouse without responding when asked if he required medical assistance, it said.
Video footage of the meeting has been preserved as evidence.
Granteed faces misdemeanor charges of simple assault, disrupting a meeting and disorderly conduct and a summary harassment charge. He was arraigned Friday morning and was released after posting bail, which was set at $25,000.
Granteed declined to comment Friday.
More background
Granteed’s public comment largely expressed his dissatisfaction with an election board majority’s selection last month of a Democrat (Boyle) to fill the fifth board chairmanship seat.
The county’s home rule charter requires the four council-appointed election board members — two Republicans and two Democrats — to choose a fifth citizen of any affiliation or no affiliation. The seat was open because Denise Williams, a Democrat, resigned in December to run for county council.
The council-appointed board members are Republicans Alyssa Fusaro (vice chair) and Morelli and Democrats Albert Schlosser and Daniel Schramm.
Following public interviews of applicants for the fifth seat, Schlosser nominated Boyle, and Fusaro nominated Frank Yamrick, a Republican.
With only one round of voting required, Boyle was selected by Morelli, Schramm and Schlosser. Fusaro was the lone vote for Yamrick.
Morelli said he based his selection on the interviews. To avoid a tie-vote impasse, at least one board member must select a chair that is not from his/her party because three votes are required. The county Court of Common Pleas would have to fill the fifth seat if the board cannot reach a majority decision.
Here is a verbatim account of what transpired leading up to the sheriff department’s intervention:
Granteed: First of all, if the object is to have free and fair and accurate elections, paper ballots are the only way to do that. Single election day. One election day. Voter ID. Tallied in the different wards by the people who run the wards and citizen witnesses. That’s the only way you’re going to have it. Any electronic system is subject to hacking, fraud and outside manipulation. We’re wasting our time here if you want a free and fair election. It’s easy to put paper ballots into use if you want to do it. I can’t believe that we’re still trying to run these elections the way we’ve run them over the last three or four years. They’re so complicated. You could simplify everything by doing what I am suggesting.
The other thing I’d like to talk about is this board is made up currently of four Democrats and one Republican. Apparently Mr. Morelli forgot what he was seated to do.
The county is seeing — the country is seeing — that the Democrat party are nothing but criminals, traitors and frauds, and I’m afraid those descriptions are accurate in Luzerne County.
I’m calling for the resignation of everybody in this room and everybody in the (election) bureau.
The charter says that we’re supposed to have equal representation, and after the vote for the chairperson — and this is nothing personal — but we did not get equal representation.
We have two spineless people on this board on the Democrat side and a walking example of fraud on the Republican side.
He voted against most conservative issues when you decided to show up for meetings and when you weren’t in a hurry to get out of here.
This board is nothing but an unconstitutional group that doesn’t represent the overwhelmingly conservative Luzerne County majority.
These issues should be decided by voters that are affected by the outcomes, not a partisan panel of activists that we thought had ended with the resignation of Denise Williams.
This board should be abolished due to its unconstitutional design and its unconstitutional charter design.
Chairwoman Boyle: Your time is up.
Granteed: Maybe Morelli supports drag queen story hour for children, radical trans surgeries for men and women..
Boyle: Sir. Sir. You are out of order. Your time is up. You will step away from the podium.
(As Granteed heads toward his seat, a sheriff deputy approached Granteed and pointed to the exit door as Morelli responded to Granteed.)
Morelli: Can I just ask you a quick question? What was I seated to do? What was I supposed to do? Please go ahead. Was I supposed to come in here and follow somebody? Maybe run for election one day, and you’ll realize you’ve got to do the right thing. You’ll learn how to do the right thing someday. I don’t follow anyone’s orders.
Fusaro: Banged the gavel three times.
Granteed: (Addressing the deputy sheriff) You don’t work for them. You work for me. You put me out, and we’re going to have a hell of a lawsuit against you. I can say whatever I want.
(The sheriff deputy temporarily left Granteed, who sat down)
Boyle: Ok, this conversation is done.
Boyle instructed the next speaker to approach the podium but then advised her to return to her seat until the matter with Granteed was resolved because two sheriff deputies approached Granteed to remove him.
As the two sheriff deputies were already attempting to remove Granteed, Crocamo spoke up for the first time and asked Granteed, “Sir, please leave.”
Granteed told the deputies they have no authority “to take me out” and to not touch him, threatening a lawsuit.
Crocamo said the sheriff’s department has absolute authority.
“He’s disrupting the meeting. Remove him,” Crocamo said.
Crocamo said later she had a responsibility to speak in support of the removal already initiated by sheriff deputies because he was resisting, and she oversees the sheriff’s department and courthouse security.
There were counter-allegations of assault between Granteed and the deputies before they removed him.
Seeking clarity
Benjamin R. Herring sent a letter to Boyle Thursday indicating that his organization, Citizens Advisory of Pennsylvania, has been contacted “due to events that transpired” at Wednesday’s election board meeting.
Herring said Granteed was providing comments during public comment “when a ‘back and forth’ ensued” between Granteed and Morelli.
“While we acknowledge and respect the decorum that is required per Roberts Rules as well as Luzerne County policy regarding conduct at meetings, the alleged incident that occurred may have been improperly handled. If in fact, Mr. Granteed was responding to comments being directed at him by Election Board Member Morelli, it would be hard to argue that he ‘went over his allotted time,’” Herring wrote.
Herring said he will await posting of the video to “confirm what exactly transpired.”
The board chair is the “sole authority” to enforce policy conformance during the meeting, maintaining that includes removal of a citizen, said Herring, who serves as the council-appointed Republican on the county ethics commission.
Video
Unlike county council meetings, no video of the election board meeting is posted on YouTube.
Scott Cannon, of Video Innovations, has an agreement to broadcast county council meetings for Service Electric Cable, and he agreed to post council meetings on YouTube more than a decade ago at the request of a council member for those outside the television station’s broadcast area.
According to an October communication from Cannon, he started livestreaming county election board meetings independently several years ago as a public service when he was available, using free software from home and a private YouTube channel.
However, his October email said he would no longer be livestreaming election board meetings due to “conspiracy theories” about censorship spread on talk radio about a missed election board meeting. Cannon said he was unable to attend one election board meeting because he was filming a Wilkes-Barre League of Women Voters 119th District Forum held at the same time.
“Due to my wife’s concern for these accusations and the potential for retaliation, I’ve decided to stop live streaming election board meetings. However, I’ll continue broadcasting and livestreaming county council meetings per my agreement with Luzerne County,” Cannon had said.