Voter fraud charges against Paterson Councilman and mayoral candidate Alex Mendez were dropped after six years, Mendez announced Monday.
The court victory allows Mendez to proceed to next month’s mayoral election without the weight of an indictment around his neck. Superior Court Judge Sohail Mohammed dismissed the case on speedy trial grounds and the state prosecutors’ failure to disclose an immunity agreement that had been reached with a key witness, according to the Paterson Press.
“Today, they dismissed this case,” Mendez said in a Facebook live stream announcing the news. “For the last six years, we’ve been in court, been accused of voter fraud. Today, this case is dismissed.”
Mendez’s trial had been scheduled for May 19. The case against his wife, Yohanny, was also dismissed. The trial had been set for April, but it was delayed after prosecutors signaled their intent to add four witnesses to the trial.
“We strongly disagree with the court’s decision to dismiss the superseding indictment, and we’re evaluating all of our options in this case,” Attorney General Jennifer Davenport said in a statement.
Mendez and fellow Councilman Michael Jackson were charged with election fraud, mail-in ballot fraud, unauthorized possession of ballots, tampering with public records, and falsifying records. They had allegedly engaged in mail-in ballot fraud during Paterson’s 2020 municipal election, when the U.S. Postal Inspection Service found hundreds of mail-in ballots bound together in a series of mail deposit boxes. Mendez faced other counts of false registration of transfer and attempted false registration or transfer.
Jackson filed for his case to be dismissed last week, according to the Paterson Press. The motion alleges that a state investigator gave “inaccurate information” to a grand jury about witness statements in Jackson’s case. Jackson is also running for mayor next month.
Paterson Mayor Andre Sayegh is running for re-election, and former Councilman Mohammed Akhtaruzzaman is the fourth and final candidate on the ballot.
Mendez and Jackson won re-election to the council in 2024 despite their pending indictments.
Unless appealed, the Mendez case dismissal signals the end of the yearslong prosecution, which was helmed by the embattled Office of Public Integrity and Accountability. The Attorney General’s Office has 45 days to appeal the ruling, should they decide to take that course.
This article was updated at 2:44 p.m. with a statement from Davenport.