NOT REAL NEWS: Alabama Democrat not ‘recently’ arrested

MONTGOMERY, Ala. – A story circulating online falsely suggests the head of the Alabama Democratic Party has recently been arrested.

The stories posted this week on sites called Conservative Army and Right Wing News says that Alabama Democratic Party Chairwoman Nancy Worley was “recently” in legal trouble after being indicted for several felonies and misdemeanours and had been hauled away in handcuffs.

Efforts to reach the sites by email and Twitter were not immediately successful.

The stories, hedged on the vague definition of “recently,” discuss decade-old criminal allegations against Worley, and do not make clear that most of the charges against her were dropped.

Worley had served as Alabama’s secretary of state. She was indicted in 2007 on charges that stemmed from campaign material she sent to her employees in the secretary of state’s office during her 2006 re-election bid.

Worley in 2012 pleaded guilty to a misdemeanour charge of soliciting campaign support from her office staff. Prosecutors agreed to drop four other misdemeanours and five felony charges.

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This is part of The Associated Press’ ongoing effort to fact-check misinformation that is shared widely online, including work with Facebook to identify and reduce the circulation of false stories on the platform.

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Find all AP Fact Checks here: https://www.apnews.com/tag/APFactCheck

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