Prosecutor to appeal against Texas woman’s acquittal over voting error

A Texas prosecutor will appeal against a court ruling tossing out a five-year prison sentence for a woman who unintentionally tried to vote while ineligible in the 2016 election, an unexpected move that continues one of the most closely watched voting prosecutions in the US.

Last month, the second court of appeals, which is based in Fort Worth, threw out the 2018 conviction of Crystal Mason, a Black woman who submitted a provisional ballot in 2016 that ultimately went uncounted. Mason was on supervised release for a federal felony at the time and has said she had no idea she was ineligible. The panel said prosecutors had failed to prove Mason actually knew she was ineligible.

The Tarrant county district attorney Phil Sorrells, a Republican, announced on Thursday he was appealing to the Texas court of criminal appeals, the highest criminal court in Texas.

“The trial court’s guilty verdict should be affirmed. Voting is a cornerstone of our democracy. This office will protect the ballot box from fraudsters who think our laws don’t apply to them,” he said in a statement.