Texas woman sentenced to 5 years in prison for voting while on probation

[Elley Mae]

Even if she did know, five years in prison is way too harsh.

Could have been 20 years.

Mason's illegal voting case was prosecuted in Tarrant County, the same place where a Mexican national last year was sentenced to eight years in prison over illegal voting. Voting illegally in Texas is a second-degree felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-st...ntenced-5-years-for-voting-while-on-probation

Mason testified that when she voted in November 2016, she signed a provisional ballot affidavit stating that she had not been convicted of a felony. Prosecutors said she signed the form with the intent to vote illegally, but Mason's attorney called it a mistake.

 

[Elley Mae]

That's not accurate. Felons who completed their punishment could vote in TX, but she was still on probation.

Yes she was on probation, so until that period was complete she is a convicted felon.

 

[margarita25]

View attachment 132259



Texas woman sentenced to 5 years in prison for voting while on probation



Crystal Mason said she had no idea she wasn't allowed to vote. “You think I would jeopardize my freedom?" she said according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. "Who would — as a mother, as a provider — leave their kids over voting?”

BY MEAGAN FLYNN, THE WASHINGTON POST MARCH 30, 2018

If she had known it was illegal, Crystal Mason said she would have never cast a vote in the 2016 presidential election.

The 43-year-old former tax preparer hadn’t even planned on voting until her mother encouraged her to do it. She had only recently been released from federal prison for a 2012 tax fraud conviction, in which she pleaded guilty to inflating returns for her clients, her attorney, J. Warren St. John, told The Washington Post.

She was still on community supervision at the time of the election — but no one, including her probation officer, St. John said, ever told her that being a felon on supervision meant she couldn’t vote under Texas law.

Now, she’s going back to prison for casting a ballot illegally — for five years.

Is she on the same floor as all the pot smokers in prison?

(Eta: another heinous crime! )

 

[rsd1200]

Guilty.

Even i know with felony conviction one can’t vote, and i’ve never been a felon.

In varies from state to state. In Ky. they had passed a law that non-violent felons could vote after serving their time (which included parole). The next Gov in, put the old law back into place. In Texas, I think you can vote, after completing all of your time, including parole, but, she wasn't legal. Five years is a lot of time though.

 

[jjenny]

Yes she was on probation, so until that period was complete she is a convicted felon.

So you are now arguing that once one completes probation, one is no longer a convicted felon?

 

[Elley Mae]

So you are now arguing that once one completes probation, one is no longer a convicted felon?

No not at all but after probation completion she could then vote.


At the time of the 2016 election, Mason was on probation after pleading guilty to defrauding the federal government in 2011. She served nearly three years in prison on a five-year sentence. After her prison release, she was put on a three-year term of supervised release. She also had to pay $4.2 million in restitution, according to court documents.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-st...ntenced-5-years-for-voting-while-on-probation

 

[jjenny]

No not at all but after probation completion she could then vote.


At the time of the 2016 election, Mason was on probation after pleading guilty to defrauding the federal government in 2011. She served nearly three years in prison on a five-year sentence. After her prison release, she was put on a three-year term of supervised release. She also had to pay $4.2 million in restitution, according to court documents.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-st...ntenced-5-years-for-voting-while-on-probation

Your earlier post claimed felons couldn't vote, implying that everybody should have known that. But that's not accurate and I am not surprised that the woman believed she could vote. TX seems to be going after any case they can find (and they have found very few) trying to prove there is some sort of massive voter fraud. Sentencing this woman to five years in prison for a vote that didn't even count?

 

[Elley Mae]

Your earlier post claimed felons couldn't vote, implying that everybody should have known that. But that's not accurate and I am not surprised that the woman believed she could vote. TX seems to be going after any case they can find (and they have found very few) trying to prove there is some sort of massive voter fraud. Sentencing this woman to five years in prison for a vote that didn't even count?

Sorry i can’t help.

 

[rsd1200]

No not at all but after probation completion she could then vote.


At the time of the 2016 election, Mason was on probation after pleading guilty to defrauding the federal government in 2011. She served nearly three years in prison on a five-year sentence. After her prison release, she was put on a three-year term of supervised release. She also had to pay $4.2 million in restitution, according to court documents.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-st...ntenced-5-years-for-voting-while-on-probation

She only got five years, and served three, for a $4.2 million tax fraud charge, and they give her the same, five, for a vote that never was even counted? Neither punishment fit the crime. There's folks who have gotten five years for much less than a $4.2 mil tax fraud charge. The voting charge was way too much but the other poor woman got eight for her voting charge. That's just far, far, too much. She'll likely get out in three, but still.

These folks, in the article below, didn't get near that much, I know it's a different state, but it was an actual vote buying scheme. There were four in on it, too.

A Magoffin County magistrate convicted in a vote-buying conspiracy was sentenced Thursday to two years and nine months in federal prison.

http://www.kentucky.com/news/state/article118305558.html

 

[Seeker404]

The first of many!

 

[JerseyGirl]

Texas Woman Sentenced to 5 Years in Prison for Voter Fraud Loses Bid for New Trial

A judge who sentenced a Texas woman to five years in prison for voting illegally because she was a felon turned down on Monday the woman’s bid for a new trial.