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Cyber Ninjas, the company contracted to head Arizona Republicans' 2020 election review, will face a daily $50,000 fine if it does not immediately relinquish election review documents, a judge said Thursday.
Maricopa County Superior Court Judge John Hannah told the firm to hand over the records, finding Cyber Ninjas in contempt for not doing so. Two Maricopa County judges and the Arizona Court of Appeals have ruled the documents in question are subject to laws regarding public records
Hannah said the daily fine would start accumulating on Friday and, if needed, would be applied not only to the corporation but to individuals as well.
Jack Wilenchik, a lawyer representing Cyber Ninjas, said the company has laid off all employees, including its former CEO Doug Logan, and is now insolvent. He said the company is unable to go into its records to find the audit documents.
Hannah said there's no evidence proving that the company is insolvent and mentioned that millions of dollars were donated to the election review. Cyber Ninjas could turn over the documents to the state Senate with little cost and let legislative lawyers decide what should be released publicly, Hannah added.
"The court is not going to accept the assertion that Cyber Ninjas is an empty shell and that no one is responsible for seeing that it complies," the judge said.
The $50,000 daily fine imposed by Hannah far exceeds the $1,000 levy suggested by a lawyer for The Arizona Republic newspaper, which filed the public records lawsuit earlier this year. Hannah said the lower amount would be "grossly insufficient" to coerce Cyber Ninjas to comply with his orders.
Wilenchik maintains Cyber Ninjas is not subject to the Arizona public records law because it's a private company. Trial and appellate judges have disagreed, ruling that the documents must be released because the firm was performing a core government function on behalf of the Senate. The Arizona Supreme Court declined to take the case on appeal.
Wilenchik has asked to quit as the Cyber Ninjas lawyer because he hasn't been paid, but Hannah refused to approve that until new local attorneys are in place to represent the firm. Two out-of-state lawyers, Jonathan Miller of Georgia and Mike Smith of Michigan, said they'll represent Logan as the former CEO, but Hannah said they couldn't participate in the hearing until they're given temporary approval to practice in Arizona.
Hannah's refusal to release Wilenchik prompted a tense exchange in which the lawyer said the judge has "shown an intemperate attitude towards me and my firm" and was biased against conservatives. He vowed to appeal.
A spokesman for Cyber Ninjas, Rod Thomson, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the judge's ruling.
The review began with a sweeping subpoena issued by Senate Republican leaders in late 2020 as Trump and his allies searched in vain for evidence to support his claim the election was stolen. The subpoena demanded access to all 2.1 million ballots, the machines that counted them and troves of digital election data from Maricopa County, home to 60% of Arizona voters.
Senate President Karen Fann hired Cyber Ninjas, a Florida-based company with no election review experience, to lead what she described as a "forensic audit." Logan previously worked with attorneys and Donald Trump supporters trying to overturn the 2020 election and appeared in a film questioning the results of the contest while the ballot review was ongoing.
A second public records lawsuit filed by the watchdog group American Oversight is seeking similar records.
Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Michael Kemp on Thursday denied Wilenchik's request to withdraw from that case as well. He said he won't consider granting the request until, at a minimum, Cyber Ninjas turns over records and Logan gives a deposition.
"The court and the public would be denied prompt and reasonable resolution of an important public matter," Kemp wrote.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
