OHIO STATE JOURNAL ON DISPUTE RESOLUTION (Vol. 27:2 2012] eye towards disaggregating post-election disputes to analyze when and whether mediation might have been productively injected. A. Early Attempt to Stop Counting ofBallots In his engaging book on the 2008 Franken-Coleman recount, Jay Weiner identifies several instances when the parties rushed to court. In one early example, a few days before the statute-mandated manual recount, the discovery of thirty-two uncounted absentee ballots in Minneapolis prompted the Coleman team to file for a temporary restraining order to prevent these ballots (and, reaching for the moon, any other ballots statewide not counted on Election Day) from being counted.116 At a hastily called Saturday morning hearing the day after the Coleman team filed its motion, Ramsey County Chief Judge Kathleen Geiran was extremely hesitant to issue the order, citing concerns about jurisdiction. Minnesota election procedure required election contests to be overseen by an appointed three-judge panel. 117 After bipartisan bickering and accusations leveled back and forth, the judge ultimately refused to enter a temporary restraining order or, for that matter, as the Franken side demanded, award $1,460 in attorney's fees. The motion denied, votes in the end were counted, but not after what is described as a series of press moves calculated to misinform.118 Instructive for these purposes, "[i]n this initial scuffle between 116 Weiner, supra note 62, at 28. 11 7 Judge Kathleen Gearin dismissed the matter because no party had yet filed an election contest lawsuit. Such a lawsuit would be filed in the Ramsey District Court, and would be subject to MINN. STAT. § 209.045 (2008). As prescribed by statute, the case would then be determined in Ramsey County by a three-judge panel appointed by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. See Order in re: Motion for a temporary injunction and/or a temporary restraining order, Minnesota Judicial Branch, Nov. 8, 2008, available at http://www.rnncourts.gov/default.aspx?page=NewsltemDisplay&item=43582&printFrien dly=true. 11 8 Coleman's team called a press conference at which it expressed concerns about a later debunked report that the absentee ballots had been riding around in an election official's trunk, suggesting a real possibility of tampering. Weiner, supra note 62, at 29. Despite the election official in question confirming that the story was untrue, the story refused to die; (See David Brauer, Minnesota Election Director Speaks: "Ballots in My Car" Story False, MINNPOST.COM, Nov. 12, 2008, http://www.minnpost.com/davidbrauer/2008/ll/12/4565/minneapolis_election_director_s peaks_ballots_in_my_car_story_false). See also Paul Schmeltzer, Fox, with Pawlenty's Help, Continues Spreading Car-Ballot Fiction, THE MINNESOTA INDEPENDENT, Nov.l3, 354 HeinOnline -- 27 Ohio St. J. on Disp. Resol. 354 2012