A Texas court has overturned a five-year sentence against a Black woman who was convicted for casting a ballot when she was ineligible to vote. In its ruling on March 28, the Tarrant County-based Second Court of Appeals said there’s no evidence to prove that Crystal Mason knowingly committed voter fraud while she was placed on supervised release for a prior conviction.
“I am overjoyed to see my faith rewarded today,” Mason said in a statement, per NPR. “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 voted in the 2016 election while she remained on supervised release after serving time for federal tax evasion charges. The Texas woman said she thought she was eligible to vote after being released from prison. While she wasn’t listed on the voter rolls in 2016, Mason cast a provisional ballot. In the end, the ballot wasn’t even counted.
Attorney Alison Grinter Allen, who represented Mason, said the conviction “should have never happened.”
“Crystal and her family have suffered for over six years as the target of a vanity project by Texas political leaders,” Allen said in an interview with NPR. “We’re happy that the court saw this for the perversion of justice that it is, but the harm that this political prosecution has done to shake Americans’ confidence in their own franchise is incalculable.”
Initially, the Second Court of Appeals upheld Mason’s conviction. Two years ago, however, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals said the lower court must “evaluate the sufficiency” of the evidence against Mason. According to the ruling, the lower court “erred by failing to require proof that [Mason] had actual knowledge that it was a crime for her to vote while on supervised release,” per the Texas Tribune.
Thomas Buser-Clancy, ACLU Texas’ senior staff attorney, said Mason “has waited for too long with uncertainty about whether she would be imprisoned and separated from her family for five years simply for trying to do her civic duty,” The Texas Tribune reported.
He added, “The harms of the criminal prosecution can never fully be undone, but this decision is vindication for Ms. Mason and a win for our democracy, which can only thrive when people can fearlessly engage in the civic process.”
