In a reversal, the backers of a failed petition drive to put a York County casino question on the November ballot have withdrawn their appeal to the state’s highest court and apparently given up their hopes to revive the campaign.

Attorney Bruce Merrill, who represents the casino proponents, filed a motion with the Maine Supreme Judicial Court on Tuesday to dismiss the appeal that he had filed on April 11. Merrill sought to challenge a lower court judge’s decision that affirmed a determination by Secretary of State Matt Dunlap that the Horseracing Jobs Fairness campaign failed to submit 62,123 valid signatures to qualify for the ballot.

Merrill’s latest filing with the court offered no explanation for the reversal. He did not respond to a phone message request for comment.

The judicial branch had created a special page on the “High Profile Cases” section of its website to make filings in the appeal easily accessible to the public. The latest entry on the web page states: “This motion constitutes a voluntary dismissal of the appeal, and the appeal is now concluded.”

Timothy Feeley, a spokesman for the Maine Attorney General’s Office, which would have represented Dunlap in the appeal, said he was aware the appeal had been withdrawn but declined to comment on any reasoning the casino backers may have had for their reversal.

The casino campaign had been mounted by the sister of Las Vegas gambling mogul Shawn Scott. If successful, it would have allowed Scott – and only Scott – to build a casino in York County. The principal officer of the campaign was Lisa Scott of Miami, Florida – the sister of Shawn Scott.

The plan would have authorized Shawn Scott’s group to apply for a license to operate slot machines and table games at a facility in York County. It would exempt the operator from a state law that prohibits a casino from opening within 100 miles of existing casinos or slot machine facilities. There are currently two casinos in Maine: Hollywood Casino in Bangor and the Oxford Casino. The bill also would have raised the state limit on the number of registered slot machines from 3,000 to 4,500.

Linwood Higgins, a lobbyist for the Maine Harness Horsemen’s Association, said passage of the petition drive bill would have been a boon for his group but the association had been doubtful from the beginning due to the controversy around the effort.

“It certainly would have benefited the Harness Horsemen’s Association,” Higgins said by phone Thursday. “We were hopeful that we would have been able to get legislation through this session that would have negated the need for the petition effort. But that didn’t happen. Now we’re back to square one.”

The Horseracing Jobs Fairness committee raised more than $2.95 million toward its campaign, according to its latest campaign finance report filed on April 11 with the state Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices. The money came entirely from contributions from Lisa Scott.

Of the $2.95 million raised, the campaign spent nearly $2.7 million. Those expenditures include nearly $2.19 million on hired workers, more than $339,000 on airfare and ground transportation and numerous other expenses including office supplies, room rentals, food and coffee and legal expenses. It includes $5,010 paid to Merrill for the initial Superior Court appeal in March, but it includes no expenses after March 21.

The high court had laid out an accelerated schedule after the appeal was filed to have attorneys on the two sides file written briefs by Thursday, with oral arguments on April 26. Under state law, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court would have had to issue a ruling on the appeal within 30 days of Superior Court Justice Michaela Murphy’s decision April 7.

Merrill had contended in the withdrawn appeal that Murphy made a legal mistake in her decision and that it “cannot be reconciled” with her ruling in another petition drive seeking to legalize marijuana. In the marijuana campaign, Murphy overruled Dunlap’s decision that its supporters, too, had failed to collect enough valid signatures.

In the casino campaign case, Murphy ruled that Horseracing Jobs Fairness failed to produce enough evidence to prove that election officials erred when invalidating 55,776 of the 91,294 signatures submitted for certification in February.

Most of the disputed petitions were invalidated because of questions about the signatures of notaries, as was the case with the marijuana legalization petition effort. Maine law requires a notary to sign each petition after taking an oath from the person who circulated it that all the signatures were made in his or her presence by registered voters. The majority of the casino petitions were notarized by Stavros Mendros, a former Lewiston legislator whose company was hired to collect signatures for the petition campaigns.

But in rejecting the casino appeal, Murphy noted that even if she overturned Dunlap’s decision on the notaries, the casino proponents still wouldn’t have had enough valid signatures of registered voters. She found the Secretary of State’s Office disqualified many of those signatures for more than one reason, leaving the casino petitioners at least 7,346 voter signatures short of the required 61,123 to reach the ballot.

In the marijuana case, Dunlap’s office is now reviewing individual signatures to see whether that petition drive qualifies for the ballot.

Scott Dolan can be contacted at 791-6304 or at:

sdolan@pressherald.com

Twitter: @scottddolan