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A Monmouth County Superior Court Judge has scheduled a July 2 preliminary hearing on the legal challenge to the Asbury Park City Council election, according to the civil case management office in Freehold.

The challenge was filed by Daniel Harris III [right], an unsuccessful candidate on the A-Team slate. His petition seeks the counting of 332 vote by mail ballots and 32 provisional ballots that were disallowed by the Monmouth County Board of Elections.

The number of ballots in dispute are enough to change the election results. The fives candidates certified as winners by the Board of Elections — Amy Quinn, John Moor and Myra Campbell of the One Asbury ticket and incumbents John Loffredo and Susan Henderson of the Forward Asbury ticket — will be sworn in the day before the hearing on July 1.

The July 2 hearing is an Order to Show Cause hearing. The judge will decide whether to grant Harris’s request for a trial. If so, a trial date will be scheduled and parameters for fact-finding before the trial will be established.

If new winners are declared by court order, those winners will then be sworn in at a later date, according to Frederic Bor, the attorney representing Harris in the challenge.

Superior Court Judge Dennis O’Brien is assigned to the case, according to the civil case management office.

The petition filed by Harris lists respondents as the Monmouth County Board of Elections, the Monmouth County Commissioner of Registration, the Monmouth County Superintendent of Elections, the Monmouth County Clerk and winning candidates Moor, Quinn, Campbell, Loffredo and Henderson.

Click here for a prior Sun story reporting the details of Harris’s petition.

 

 

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