The only mention I could find of Raymond Lemme on dKos is a passing mention in
this diary from back in February, and apparently there have been some significant developments since.
So, I'm reposting excerpts from this post from "Xymphora", a Blogspot/Blogger blog:
Raymond Lemme was an investigator from the Florida Inspector General's office at the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT). He is now dead, an apparent suicide. Lemme was the investigator assigned to the case of Clint Curtis, a Florida programmer who has made some disturbing allegations about Chinese spying and computer vote rigging in Florida. You might think a story tying a Republican congressman to both Communist Chinese espionage and computer vote rigging might be big news, but you'd be wrong
continued below the fold
"Late last year, Congress heard sworn testimony from Florida
programmer Clint Curtis, who created vote-rigging software in 2000 at
the request of Tom Feeny, a Bush Family factotum. Feeny wanted Curtis
(a fellow Republican) and his employer, Yang Enterprises, to produce
untraceable programs that could 'control the vote' as needed,
investigator Brad Friedman reported. Feeny also told Curtis of Bush
plans to 'suppress the black vote' with 'exclusion lists.' This is
exactly what happened. BBC investigator Greg Palast has shown that tens
of thousands of legitimate African-American voters were deliberately
'purged' from the rolls by a private Republican-controlled corporation
hired by Florida Governor Jeb Bush. Afterwards, Feeny - who had been
Jeb's running mate in his first gubernatorial campaign - was rewarded
for his dutiful service with a plum congressional seat.
In 2002,
Raymond Lemme, a Florida state government inspector, took up Curtis'
charges, which included other corruption allegations involving Feeny,
Yang Enterprises and a Yang employee charged with peddling military
technology to the Chinese. In June 2003, Lemme told Curtis he had
'tracked the corruption all the way to the top' and that 'the story
would break in a few weeks.' On July 1, 2003, Lemme was found dead in a
Georgia hotel room, just across the Florida border.
Local police
ruled that Lemme, a happily married man eagerly planning his daughter's
wedding, had suddenly decided to slash his wrists. At first they said
there were no photos of the death scene; but then the pictures turned
up on the Internet and were confirmed as authentic by the embarrassed
police. The photos clearly contradicted the original suicide report on
several points - presenting evidence, for example, that Lemme had been
beaten before his death. The investigation was reopened after Curtis'
Congressional testimony - and then abruptly shut down after local
police spoke to a never-identified 'someone' in the Florida state
government."
This story has received exemplary coverage in
The Brad Blog (index of articles
here: see also
here and especially
here). The disgusting local press has
tried to 'manage' the problem for Jeb and Feeny, but has been deftly
parried by
The Brad Blog.
As well as alleging vote fraud, Curtis also testified to the illegal
shipment of computer chips to China by an employee of the same computer
firm which was working on the vote-rigging software. The employee has
admitted to the gist of the charges in a
plea agreement he has entered into. A contract between FDOT and the programming company in question was
terminated
by FDOT as a result of the investigation launched after allegations
first made by Curtis. Officials apparently find at least some parts of
Curtis' testimony worth acting on. As well, Curtis has passed a
polygraph
examination concerning his allegations. There is every reason to
believe that the story told by Curtis of computer vote-rigging in
Florida is true, and the extraordinary circumstances of the death of
investigator Raymond Lemme adds the unmistakable odor of a conspiracy
cover-up. To summarize the weirdness (excellent full summary
here):
- Curtis
stated in his affidavit that Lemme had told him in June of 2003 that
"he had tracked the corruption 'all the way to the top' and that the
story would break in the next few weeks."
- Lemme's body
was found in a motel in Valdosta, Georgia, about 80 miles from
Tallahassee and just over the Georgia state line. Had he killed himself
in Florida there would have been a mandatory state autopsy. There is no
such requirement in Georgia.
- His wife reported him
missing on the day she couldn't locate him, which was June 30. However,
the documentation from the motel shows that he signed in on June 29.
Even better, it shows he signed out on June 30, a pretty good trick for
a dead man. The date discrepancies may be because of an error in the
computer at the motel, but that still doesn't explain how a dead man
checks out.
- His unsigned suicide note fails to mention
his only daughter, who was due to be married in three weeks and about
whom he often talked. Everyone who knew Lemme said it was very out of
character for him to disappear as he did.
- The Valdosta police investigators reported that they had no crime scene photos due to a malfunction of the flash memory cards in the digital camera they used (i. e., more than one card must have failed). The photographs,
which were no doubt released by an honest cop, appeared on the
internet. The police lied. Why would they do a thing like that unless
they didn't want anyone to see the photos?
- The
investigators reported that he killed himself by slitting his wrists,
and there was no other trauma to the body. The graphic crime scene
photos show an unmistakable discoloration to the side of the neck, as
if he'd been sapped to knock him out before his murderers slit his
wrists to stage the suicide.
- The police report states:
"On
the bathroom floor next to the bathtub was a black in color man's dress
belt, which was lying on the top of a white in color hotel bath mat.
The belt appeared to have been used as a tourniquet; dried blood was
visible on the belt but was not visible on the towel."
The crime scene photo shows this to be incorrect, with blood clearly visible on the towel.
- The Valdosta police reopened the investigation and then quickly closed it again after a call from a mysterious Florida official.
- Why would a guy who wanted to kill himself drive 80 miles to the sleasiest motel (see here) in Valdosta, Georgia?
- A witness saw three men outside of Lemme's room, and thought it was strange that they were standing there.
- The Supplemental
Incident Report claims the police were summoned as a customer refused
to vacate a hotel room. They really enforce the check-out time in
Valdosta! Do the police commonly enforce the check-out of motel
customers? When they are two hours late? When the customer had signed a
check-out receipt at 6:54 a. m.?
- Lemme's watch was placed neatly next to the sink. It had stopped. Why would it have stopped? Did it break in the trauma of his kidnapping?
- From The Brad Blog:
"We
had hoped to speak with Det. Shannon Floyd since she took the crime
scene photos and wrote the most detailed report in the case file. She
was the one who reported the camera's 'flash memory cards' as having
failed, said that there were no 'signs of trauma', that 'Nothing was
observed that would indicate foul play' and described there being no
visible blood on the white towel next to the tub. She also described
the stopped watch and the check-in and check-out receipts, along with
their dates, but mentioned nothing about the apparent inconsistency in
dates.
In our first conversation with Valdosta's Capt.
Childress, he had informed us that Det. Floyd was no longer with the
department and was now teaching at a university. He didn't feel it
appropriate to let us know where she was teaching, but in our second
call, he informed us that, 'Det. Floyd does not work for us anymore.
She left and is teaching somewhere now. I'm not gonna tell ya where she
is. Her husband said she didn't want to talk to the media. I spoke with
him last night after we spoke.'"
A diligent
investigator discovers that vote fraud goes all the way to the top of
government in Florida. The thugs who run Florida have three enforcers
kidnap the investigator, drive him up to the nearest place where they
can be safe from an autopsy, knock him out, and stage his suicide by
slitting his wrists. Pressure is put on local investigators, no doubt
used to doing dirty work for the thugs who run Florida from the wild
city of Tallahassee, to lose the crime scene photos and deliver a
report completely consistent with suicide. An honest cop releases the
photos, so the preparer of the report has to disappear, and local
police have to clam up. One phone call from Tallahassee shuts down the
reopening of the investigation. Honest men like Raymond Lemme deserve
better than this sordid cover-up. His staged 'suicide' is proof that
the allegations of Clint Curtis are true. The conspirators always give
themselves away in the cover-up. You will know them by the trail of
dead.