The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
N.C. operative faces charges in scandal
The North Carolina political operative at the center of a ballot fraud scandal was arrested Wednesday on criminal charges over his collection of absentee ballots in the 2016 elections and the Republican primary in 2018, a state prosecutor said.
Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr. was arrested for his alleged role in Mark Harris’ tainted congressional victory.
Who is he?
Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr., 63, was arrested less than a week after the state elections board decided his work on behalf of Republican congressional candidate Mark Harris tainted Harris’ apparent victory in November’s general election and a new election was required, Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman said.
Following that decision, Harris announced Tuesday he would not run in a new election.
Why is he in the news?
Dowless was charged in grand jury indictments alleging illegal possession of absentee ballots, obstruction of justice and conspiracy to obstruct justice. North Carolina law makes it illegal for anyone other than the voter or a close relative to handle a mail-in ballot.
The alleged criminal acts “thereby served to undermine the integrity of the absentee ballot process and the public’s confidence in the outcome of the electoral process,” the indictments said.
Also charged were people Dowless allegedly paid to collect ballots during the spring of 2018, when Dowless and his team were being paid by Harris’ campaign, and in the 2016 general election, when Dowless himself ran for a local soil and water conservation post.
What happens next?
Freeman said court hearings in the criminal case will be scheduled during the last week of March in a Wake County court.
Freeman also is looking into irregularities uncovered during November’s general election.
Freeman said the elections board’s findings on that case are being forwarded to state criminal investigators to be reviewed in the coming weeks.