A Mesa County jury on Monday found Tina Peters guilty on seven of 10 counts related to a security breach that occurred in the spring of 2021 at the election office she oversaw as Mesa County clerk and recorder.
The jury announced its verdict just hours after closing arguments.
Peters was found guilty on three counts: attempting to influence a public servant, one count of criminal impersonation, one count of dereliction of official duty, one count of electoral dereliction of duty and one count of failure to comply with the instructions of the Secretary of State. She was acquitted on two counts of criminal impersonation and one count of identity theft.
“Tina Peters intentionally compromised her own voting equipment to prove Trump’s big lie,” Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold said in a statement after the verdict was announced in Mesa County District Court under Judge Matthew Barrett. “She was found guilty by a jury of her peers and will now face the consequences of her actions. Today’s verdict sends a clear message: We will not tolerate attempts to compromise the security of our gold standard elections. I am proud that Colorado voters received justice today.”
Griswold’s office opened an investigation into Peters in August 2021 after learning that confidential Mesa County election system data had been posted online. In 2022, a Mesa County grand jury indicted Peters for her role in a plot that allowed an unauthorized person to enter the Mesa County Elections Office in May 2021 during a voting equipment software update (also known as a trusted build) to make copies of the election system software and take pictures of passwords and other confidential data.
That plot involved a case in which election deniers allied with former President Donald Trump found a willing county official in Colorado who deceived other state officials in an attempt to prove that the voting equipment in Mesa County was somehow corruptible.
Peters declined to comment after the verdict, telling reporters she would do so at a later date.
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In his closing argument after the eight-day trial, prosecutor Robert Shapiro, Colorado’s first assistant attorney general for special prosecutions, said Peters opened her office and herself to outsiders to facilitate a security breach in Mesa County’s election equipment.
The case involved “many layers of deception” and many people worked with Peters to carry out the fraud, Shapiro said.
One of those people was Kurt Olsen, an associate of MyPillow CEO and prominent Trump ally Mike Lindell, who is an election denier. Shapiro reminded jurors that Peters had told Olsen she was “available” to him and was there to support her efforts.
Others involved, according to prosecutors, included Ohio mathematician Douglas Frank, an election conspiracy theorist on Lindell’s payroll, Conan Hayes, a former professional surfer from California who became a conspiracy theorist, and Sherronna Bishop, a friend of Peters’ who neither lived nor worked in Mesa County but played a central role in planning a plot that gave Hayes access to the secure voting area where the break-in occurred.
Shapiro said Peters deceived a Dominion Voting Systems employee and State Department employees when she allowed an unauthorized person – Hayes – to be part of the trust setup on May 25 and 26, 2021, under the guise that he was a Mesa County employee.
According to prosecutors, Hayes entered the polling hall on May 23 when offices were closed and cameras were off to make a copy of the software on the voting system’s hard drive. He returned to the hall on May 25 to participate in the confidence-building session, which included Peters and representatives from the State Department and Dominion Voting Systems.
The surveillance cameras had already been turned off on May 17, even though Mesa County has long had a policy of keeping the cameras on 24 hours a day.
Contradictory statements
Shapiro described how Peters hired Gerald Wood, a Fruita resident, to obtain a security clearance for Hayes under his identity so that he could enter secure voting areas disguised as Wood. Wood was given a background check and a security pass, but one of Peters’ associates had to return it a few days later.
During the trial and in closing arguments, defense attorneys attempted to portray Wood as a willing participant in the conspiracy.
Shapiro said the only witness who testified that Wood was involved in the scheme was Bishop, who prosecutors say helped orchestrate the break-in. Bishop is considered by prosecutors to be an unindicted co-conspirator.
Bishop’s testimony contradicted Wood’s affidavits that he knew nothing about the plan and did not give permission for his identity to be disclosed to anyone. Shapiro said Bishop was not a credible witness.
“No other witness supported Sherronna Bishop’s testimony,” Shapiro said.
Hayes was an outside fraudster who used Woods’ identity to copy confidential data, Shapiro said.
Other evidence presented by prosecutors included that Peters had instructed employees to purchase disposable cell phones with cash and to use the encrypted text messaging platform Signal and an out-of-county email address.
Shapiro reminded jurors how in August 2021, while attending a South Dakota cybersecurity symposium – around the time Griswold launched her investigation into the election security breach – Bishop called Peters’ then-deputy Belinda Knisley in Grand Junction and asked her to go to the election office and remove the election’s computer server. Knisley refused.
When Peters learned that voting system data and passwords had been posted on an online conspiracy website, she repeatedly told Knisley, “I’m screwed, I’m going to jail,” Shapiro said.
“Does that sound like someone who is doing the right thing, doing something noble?” Shapiro told the jury.
Questions about Hayes
Defense attorney John Case began his closing argument with a piece of evidence – a photograph of Peters and her son, who died in an air show accident in 2017 while serving with the U.S. Navy SEALs.
“When Tina Peters’ son died, she was forced to find meaning in life,” and she ran for Mesa County clerk and recorder, Case said.
Case and all defense attorneys throughout the trial consistently referred to Peters as “Clerk Peters” – even though her term ended in early 2023.
Shapiro raised several objections to Case’s closing argument, saying he either misrepresented facts or raised issues that were not admitted into evidence.
Case told jurors that Bishop wanted to keep Hayes’ identity secret and that the government charged Peters with 10 felonies based on a decision to protect an individual. The defense claimed that Peters believed Hayes was a confidential government agent.
At one point in his statement, Case compared the access badge to a hotel key card that one shares with one’s husband, wife or friend.
Case said Peters came under government scrutiny after the video she recorded during the trust construction surfaced online. He said she did not consent to its release online and that it is not a crime to post videos online.
“We still value free speech unless you are targeted by the government,” Case said. “Then your opinion has no value.”
Case asked why Hayes was not called to testify.
“He is the key to the whole case,” he said. “They didn’t have the courage to call him as a witness.”
In her response to Case’s closing arguments, Assistant Attorney General Janet Drake said: explained why they had not heard from Hayes.
“It’s the trial of Tina Peters,” she said. “We’re here because she deceived an official to smuggle someone into the office.”
Drake told jurors there was plenty of evidence that Peters had criminal intent in her actions, starting with meeting with co-conspirators from out of state on April 23, 2021, turning off security cameras on May 17 of that year, using disposable phones, and using the encrypted Signal platform and emails outside the county. Drake also reiterated that after Peters learned an investigation had been launched, she “dropped the F-word” and said multiple times that she was “going to jail.”
The defense argued that Peters acted merely to protect election records, but Drake said her actions were a “deep dive” into publicly disclosing confidential information. It was all “so she could be the hero, to stand on the symposium stage and become famous for this violation,” Drake said.
“(Tina Peters) was responsible for protecting the integrity of the election and she failed to do so,” Drake said.
Peters is the “fox that guards the henhouse,” she said.
Attorney General: “A warning”
Matt Crane, executive director of the Colorado County Clerks Association, said in a statement: “Officers across the state are pleased that justice was served today. We take our role as guardians of the best election process in the country seriously and are grateful that the justice system is holding those who would harm our elections accountable.”
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser also commented on Monday’s ruling: “I want to thank the prosecutors on my team who worked side by side with Mesa County District Attorney Dan Rubinstein to bring justice in this case. They worked for several years under difficult circumstances – including heinous threats. I am grateful for their commitment to the rule of law and their devotion to duty.”
Weiser continued, “Today’s ruling is a warning to others that they will face serious consequences if they attempt to illegally manipulate our election processes or voting systems. I want to be clear: Our elections are secure and fair. In fact, Colorado’s election system is the nation’s gold standard. And make no mistake: My office will continue to protect it.”
Peters’ sentencing was scheduled for October 3.
