Police body-camera footage has emerged showing officers serving a felony criminal summons on LaKesha Womack, the Democratic candidate challenging Republican Representative Tim Moore in North Carolina's 14th congressional district, at one of her campaign events in Polk County on October 11 — a service that has become an election issue days before Tuesday's vote, WSOC-TV footage published this week shows.
Source: WSOC-TV via Headline USA
The charge is a single count of felony failure to return a hired motor vehicle. According to court records cited by WBT in Charlotte, by WBTV and by the Charlotte Observer, the case stems from Womack's alleged failure to return a 2019 Toyota Corolla sedan rented from Budget Car Rental in October 2019. The criminal summons quotes the charge in capital letters: 'You unlawfully, willfully and feloniously did FAIL TO RETURN A 2019 TOYOTA COROLLA SEDAN,' and lists the value of the car at $20,000.
Under North Carolina law as described in the reporting, a willful failure to return a rented motor vehicle valued above $4,000 is a Class H felony. If convicted, Womack could face between four and 24 months behind bars or community service for that duration, according to Fox News Digital reporting summarised by multiple outlets. The charge is an allegation that has not been tested in court, and Womack is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.
A 2020 summons, served in 2026
Court records show the summons was reissued earlier this month after the original 2020 summons was returned unserved. The Mecklenburg County Sheriff's Office confirmed to Fox News Digital that she was served a criminal summons for felony fail to return hired motor vehicle on October 11 by a deputy with the Polk County Sheriff's Office. Importantly, the sheriff's office did not confirm Womack's account that the service took place at a campaign event — that location detail comes from Womack herself and from the body-camera footage obtained by WSOC-TV.
Womack told reporters, when asked about the matter: 'I can't talk about that because it is an ongoing legal case.' In earlier videos and statements this month, she gave a fuller account. She said she first learned of the pending legal matter on October 9, during a conversation with the Gastonia branch of the NAACP, and received the summons two days later while attending a campaign rally in Polk County. She said: 'I didn't post that I was gonna be in Polk County, but they knew exactly what car I was driving. And as soon as I parked, they pulled up behind me and served my papers with my address from 2019.'
Womack attributed the original failure to return the car to a period of homelessness in 2019. In a video account summarised by Fox News Digital, she said she was homeless with little money when a medical incident sent her to intensive care, during which her son was placed into foster care. After retrieving her son, she said, 'I'm living in a hotel and, you know, scraping together, you know, dollars to buy food from Dollar Tree, to like, buy dinner for him every night. And I had a rental car. Couldn't afford the rental car, and they came and got it. And so I never knew that, you know, they have filed, you know, I guess that it was a pending felony.' She said she could not receive the January 2020 summons because she had no stable address, and admitted in an October 9 video that she did owe fees: 'I do owe them people some money.' That video appears to have since been deleted from her campaign Facebook page, according to reporting.
The race and the district
Womack, 49, is challenging incumbent Representative Tim Moore in North Carolina's 14th Congressional District, which spans Gastonia, Shelby, Morganton and parts of far south Charlotte, alongside areas of Mecklenburg, Gaston, Cleveland, Rutherford, Polk and Burke counties — a district running from Charlotte's suburbs into the rural western North Carolina foothills. Moore's campaign has released attack ads regarding the allegations through a supporting political entity, Friends of Tim Moore, according to reporting citing court documents and the campaigns.
Background: a criminal summons is not an arrest warrant for immediate custody in the way a headline 'felony warrant' can suggest; in this case officers served papers requiring a court appearance, and Womack was not reported to have been taken into custody at the event. The distinction matters for voters: the legal question is whether the 2019 failure to return the vehicle was willful under the statute, a question the November 10 hearing will begin to address, after ballots are cast.
Confirmed by a sheriff's office to Fox News Digital: the October 11 service, the agency that served it (Polk County), and the charge. From court records via Charlotte outlets: the 2019 Corolla, the $20,000 value and the 2020 summons history. From Womack herself: the campaign-event location, the homelessness account and the owed fees. Not confirmed by the sheriff's office: that the service was deliberately timed to a campaign event.
Why this matters beyond one district: the story has spread nationally because the footage landed in the final days of a midterm campaign, illustrating how an old, unserved court paper can resurface at the most politically sensitive moment. For Punjabi and other diaspora readers in North Carolina — concentrated in Charlotte, Raleigh and the Research Triangle, with trucking and small-business families across the I-85 and I-40 corridors that cross the 14th district's eastern edge — the case is a reminder that rental, court-notice and address records from years earlier can follow a person into public life, and that a missed summons at an unstable address does not by itself decide guilt.
What happens next: Election Day is Tuesday, when voters in the 14th district will choose between Moore and Womack before the case is resolved. Womack is scheduled to appear in Mecklenburg County District Court at 9 a.m. on November 10. No trial date has been set, and no court has ruled on the felony allegation.