A Fort Worth woman who was convicted of voter fraud and sentenced to 5 years in jail has had her conviction tossed out by a Texas appeals court.
Crystal Mason was convicted for trying to cast a provisional ballot in the 2016 presidential election. The ballot was rejected and the vote never counted.
Mason was not eligible to vote because she was still on probation for a 2012 tax felony. She insists she had no idea she was ineligible. She's been fighting the conviction for years.
An appellate court sided with her, It ruled there wasn't enough evidence to prove she knowingly voted when she was ineligible.
“Even if she had read them, they are not sufficient ... to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she actually knew that being on supervised release after having served her entire federal sentence of incarceration made her ineligible to vote by casting a provisional ballot,” Justice Wade Birdwell wrote in his opinion.
Mason, in a statement released by the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, said she is overjoyed, according to the Associated Press.
“I was thrown into this fight for voting rights and will keep swinging to ensure no one else has to face what I’ve endured for over six years, a political ploy where minority voting rights are under attack,” Mason said.
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