The Democrat nominee for Fort Bend County Commissioner Precinct 3, Taral Patel, has been indicted by a jury on four felony counts of online impersonation.
Patel allegedly created fake social media accounts to post racist comments about himself in an effort to cast a negative light on his Republican opponent’s supporters.
Patel, the former Chief of Staff for Fort Bend County Judge KP George, is alleged to have created accounts under the names of Antonio Scalywag, Fort Bend Judge Surendran Pattel, Jennifer Tremaine, Jane Donnie, and an employee of the county engineering department. According to prosecutors, the purpose was to influence the election by hurting his opponent Republican Commissioner Andy Meyers.
Under the Scalywag account, which purported to be a supporter of Meyers, numerous racist comments about Patel, negative comments about other Democrat candidates, and support for various Republican candidates were posted.
According to the investigation, Patel began the coordinated effort in October 2022 and, although the page is still available online, the attacks ended in May 2024 when Patel was identified.
Commissioner Meyers initially requested investigators look into the person behind the account after the series of racist online attacks. He first hired someone to determine if Scalywag was a Fort Bend County resident, and when they couldn’t, he reached out to investigators at the Fort Bend County District Attorney’s Office and included a press release from Taral with a collage of the online posts in his request for them to investigate.
Investigators with the DA’s office issued subpoenas to Meta Platforms (Facebook) for the account “Antonio Scalywag” and discovered it had been registered using the email address “MountainGoatzrule@gmail.com.” Roughly a month later they issued subpoenas to Google, Inc. and discovered the email address was registered to Patel and linked to his phone number as well as his billing information.
Patel was arrested in June and released on bond. A jury indicted him this week on four counts, each carrying the possibility of 2-20 years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
Patel has not publicly commented on the arrest, investigation, or indictment and is still actively running in the November General Election for Precinct 3 Commissioner.
