A day after he was arrested on election fraud-related charges, political operative McCrae Dowless was released from the Wake County jail on Thursday after a former member of the Bladen County Board of Elections helped bail him out.
Dowless declined to comment as he walked out the jail carrying his belongings in a plastic bag. His attorney, Cynthia Singletary, accompanied him.
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He was charged Wednesday with three counts of felonious obstruction of justice, two counts of conspiracy to commit obstruction of justice and two counts of illegal possession of an absentee ballot in connection with his get-out-the-vote work in Bladen and Robeson counties in the 2016 general election and the 2018 primary.
Ray Britt, a Bladen County commissioner and a former member of the county elections board, helped pay Dowless' $30,000 bond.
"The reason I've got him out and other people have assisted is, with him being out, we can have legal people contacting him to get to the bottom of the true source of what has been going on with elections in Bladen County for a long time," Britt said.
Four others – Caitlyn Croom, Matthew Mathis, Tonia Gordon and Rebecca Thompson – face charges of conspiracy to obstruct justice and one count of possession of an absentee ballot, according to indictments. Mathis also was charged with two counts of falsely certifying an absentee ballot.
None of them had been arrested as of Thursday.
Indictments returned by a Wake County grand jury accuse Dowless of taking at least eight ballots from people in 2016, as well as at least three ballots in 2018. In October 2016, the indictments say, he gave investigators false information and coached Mathis and Croom to do the same.
The indictments name 17 Bladen County voters whose ballots were taken in the 2016 general election or the 2018 primary by the five defendants. On two other ballots from the 2018 general election, an indictment says, Mathis falsely signed the forms using the voters’ names.
At least four voters named in the indictments whose 2016 general election ballots were taken by Dowless or Gordon also submitted counted absentee ballots in the 2018 general election. Three of those 2018 ballots – all counted – were witnessed by people connected with Dowless, according to a WRAL News analysis of absentee ballot envelopes.
The criminal charges come a week after the State Board of Elections voted to hold a new election in the 9th Congressional District after hearing testimony that Dowless' employees took possession of absentee ballots in the 2018 general election. It's a felony in North Carolina to take someone else's ballot.
Republican Mark Harris, who hired Dowless to work on his campaign, led Democratic opponent Dan McCready by 905 votes after the November election, according to unofficial results. But the state elections board refused to certify the results pending an investigation into allegations of absentee ballot fraud.
Dowless refused to testify at the the board's hearing last week. But some of his employees did, admitting under oath that he paid them to collect ballots.
Lisa Britt, who signed dozens of absentee ballots as a witness in 2018, also told elections officials that Dowless' workers sometimes completed unfinished absentee ballots and that he was aware that she forged her mother's signature as a witness on some ballots. Britt also said that Dowless had given her a note telling her what to say at the hearing.
Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman has been investigating the election fraud allegations for more than a year. She said more charges – and more defendants – are possible, given that she hasn't even reviewed the findings of the elections board's four-day hearing.
The elections board is scheduled to meet next Monday to set a date for the new 9th District election, including primaries. Officials said they plan to send teams to Bladen and Robeson counties to monitor activities in the new election.
Harris has already decided against running in the new election, while McCready has restarted his campaign. North Carolina Republican Party officials said they expect several GOP candidates in the race.