PITTSBURGH -- Local workers for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now are charged with forging, illegally soliciting or illegally filling out voter registration cards in Allegheny County before the 2008 elections.
At a Thursday morning news conference, District Attorney Stephen Zappala announced the charges against Ashley Lucille Clarke, Alexis Givner, Mario Wyatt Grisom, Latasha Leann Kinney, Eric Lee Jones, Eric Eugene Jordan and Bryan Alexander Williams for allegedly filing hundreds of fraudulent voter registrations.
"You should consider, as I said before, this is the first stage of this investigation. It has been completed with the arrest of these seven people. You should consider the investigation is ongoing," Zappala said.
Forgery is a felony in Pennsylvania and voter application fraud is a misdemeanor, reported Channel 4 Action News' Bob Mayo, who was at the news conference.
Mayo reported that the matter of whether ACORN itself or any of the organization's leadership is involved in a crime has not yet been answered.
Zappala said no votes were fraudulently cast as a result of the alleged fraud. There were also no charges of any overarching conspiracy, Mayo reported.
There were charges related to a misdemeanor crime involving allegations concerning a quota system for canvassers that they would be paid for the number of signatures they would turn in.
The investigation, which began last year, involved Allegheny County police and the FBI.
ACORN has come under scrutiny for registration irregularities in other states.
Authorities in Nevada filed charges Monday against ACORN and two former employees on charges they illegally paid canvassers to sign up voters. ACORN denies the charges.
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