Political consultant charged with forging signatures on nomination forms in 2019 Philadelphia elections
PHILADELPHIA - A local political consultant has been charged in connection with forging signatures on nomination petitions to get his clients on the ballot for the 2019 Democratic primary in Philadelphia.
Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced the arrest of Rasheen Crews on Wednesday, alleging the Philadelphia man conspired to forge thousands of signatures to get his clients' names on the ballot for the 2019 primary races in the city.
The Attorney General's Office says an investigation revealed that in 2019, multiple candidates hired Crews to help them get the required amount of signatures needed for their nomination petitions for the Democratic primary races. Officials say Crews recruited people to help with petition work and took them to a hotel, where he asked them to write names, addresses and forged signatures on multiple petitions.
Crews then had the petitions notarized and filed with the Pennsylvania Department of State on his clients' behalf, Shapiro's office says.
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According to authorities, over 1,000 signatures were determined to be duplicated, as many of the names and addresses were found repeated on various pages. Officials say some of the petition pages were photocopied and some of the listed people claimed to have never signed the petitions.
Due to questions surrounding the signatures, some candidates withdraw from the election entirely, the Attorney General's office says.
"In advance of the 2023 municipal elections, this arrest is an important reminder that interfering with the integrity of our elections is a serious crime," Shapiro said. "By soliciting and organizing the wide scale forgery of signatures, the defendant undermined the democratic process and Philadelphians' right to a free and fair election."
Crews faces several charges, including criminal solicitation to commit forgery and theft by failure to make required disposition.