ACORN Members Demand Federal Criminal Probe

Dissident ACORN members are demanding that the crooked group be investigated with a view to federal criminal charges, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports.

The splinter group, ACORN 8, released a 24-page document Wednesday that asks federal investigators to consider fraud, embezzlement and conspiracy charges, and criminal civil rights violations relating to the embezzlement of nearly $1 million from the nonprofit’s accounts and an alleged cover-up of the theft for almost a decade.

“Moreover, due to the admission that a felony has been committed, other federal offenses may have also been committed … ,” states the document signed by 14 members of ACORN 8, including recently expelled members of ACORN’s national board of directors.

The embezzlement and accusations of voter registration fraud in at least eight states, including Pennsylvania, have cost ACORN — the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now — the support of a benefactor that gave the activist group $7 million in the past decade.

The ACORN 8 complaint alleges violation of the civil rights of board members who sought to investigate the embezzlement and subsequently were removed from the board.

The action stems from a bitter dispute within ACORN since disclosure in June that Dale Rathke, brother of ACORN co-founder and former Chief Organizer Wade Rathke, embezzled $948,000.

ACORN officials last year announced a settlement agreement to recoup the money. No criminal charges resulted. […]

In November I wrote in the Washington Times about the growing demands for ACORN to be criminally probed.

POST SCRIPT later the same day: The ACORN 8 created a website.