On Monday, March 18th, former Democratic state house Representative Rodney Moore was indicted by a Mecklenburg County Grand Jury on nine felony charges involving false campaign finance disclosure reports.
Moore had turned himself in to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department sometime on Wednesday.
According to a press release from the State Board of Elections, “Moore knowingly certified under oath that false campaign finance reports were true, a violation of N.C.G.S. § 163A-1449. Each count is a Class I felony.”
Also charged is Tammy Neal, Moore’s campaign treasurer. Neal is charged with one felony count of common law obstruction of justice.
“We are grateful to the Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s Office for its work on this case, as we are to all prosecutors who take election matters seriously,” State Board executive director Kim Westbrook Strach said in a statement.
Strach said that audits like these help “detect those who try to use their campaign accounts as personal piggy banks.”
“We hope these prosecutions highlight the importance of accurate campaign finance disclosure. Voters have a right to know how candidates are raising and spending campaign cash,” said Strach.
The State Board of Elections & Ethics Enforcement voted unanimously in October of 2018 to refer the case to the Mecklenburg County district attorney after finding serious campaign finance misconduct by Moore.
The board’s investigation, which began in 2017, found that Moore’s committee failed to disclose over $141,000 in expenditures and receipts for a seven-year period between 2010 and 2017.
Additionally, the board determined that $25,000 in cash withdrawals and in cash received back from purchases went undisclosed.
The state board’s investigation also showed that Moore’s committee gave altered bank records to state board auditors.
Rodney Moore was first elected to the General Assembly as the District 99 representative for Mecklenburg County in 2010. He ran unopposed and unchallenged in 2012 and 2014.
Moore ran for the 12th Congressional seat in 2016 but dropped out of the race a month before the June primary, before resuming a run for his statehouse seat where he ran unopposed in both the primary and general election.
In 2018, Moore lost in the primary to Nasif Majeed and came in third out of four candidates. Moore received only 879 of the 5,256 votes which were cast in that primary.
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A.P. Dillon is the North Carolina Bureau Chief for The Tennesee Star and a reporter at Battleground State News. Follow A.P. Dillon on Twitter. Email Tips to [email protected].
