https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/news/fort-bend/2026/03/17/546298/fort-bend-county-judge-kp-george-trial-taral-patel/

Taral Patel, a former staffer for Fort Bend County Judge KP George, testified Tuesday in his former boss' money laundering trial.

Patel described parts of his tenure working as George’s chief of staff from 2019-2021 as "disorganized" when he would observe him, including when it came to how the county's chief executive handled his organizational skills.

"It was just very chaotic," Patel said in court. "And to be honest, in many circumstances, whether it was calendar invites on an email or different emails, it was kind of across the board, and it was sometimes often hard to schedule or coordinate meetings and events."

Sign up for the Hello, Houston! daily newsletter to get local reports like this delivered directly to your inbox.

Patel also cited significant language barriers with the county judge, who, at the time, was not proficient in English, he said. Toward the end of their time working together, Patel said working conditions improved and they figured out systems better, but he said there were still significant challenges.

"Technology was also changing, so getting him to adapt to new technology or new systems was always a headache and a challenge," Patel said.

Patel, a Democrat who lost his bid to become a Fort Bend County commissioner in 2024, pleaded guilty in 2025 to two misdemeanor counts of misrepresentation of identity by a candidate. At the time, Patel also signed an acknowledgement that he had committed one of the offenses alongside George during his 2022 reelection campaign. The county judge has also been accused of a similar crime, creating fake racist attacks against his own campaign. That trial is expected to start in May.

George was subsequently arrested on two counts of money laundering stemming from accusations last year. Prosecutors allege he used more than $46,000 in campaign funds to make a down payment on a house and to pay his property taxes. If convicted of the third-degree felony, George would be removed from office and could face up to 10 years in prison, with fines up to $10,000.

The county judge was first elected as a Democrat in 2018 and reelected in 2022. Following his indictments, George switched parties and joined the GOP this summer, but failed to secure the Republican nomination for his seat in the recent March primary elections. George secured 8.4% of the vote to place last in a five-candidate race.

After prosecutors finished calling their witnesses to the stand on Tuesday and rested their money laundering case against George, his attorneys argued that the state didn't legally present what they called sufficient evidence of fraud.

"The state's evidence suggests that campaign finance paperwork may have been unclear or imperfect, but imperfect reporting is not fraud," one of George's lawyers told Judge Maggie Perez-Jaramillo of the 458th District Court in Richmond.

Last week, jurors heard from an official with the Texas Ethics Commission (TEC), the state agency responsible for overseeing state election laws and enforcing civil penalties. James Tinley, TEC's executive director, was questioned on various regulations when it comes to filing campaign reports.

Arguments about campaign finance records continued on Monday, when jurors heard from a certified auditor with the Fort Bend County District Attorney's Office who testified about discrepancies between George's campaign finance and personal banking records.

Betty Chi said she saw what she called patterns in George's campaign and personal account activity with various loans and transfers that were not uniformly reflected on his campaign finance reports and claimed it was not an error or mistake.

Chi testified that during George's first run for elected office in 2018, he misrepresented information on his campaign finance reports. She said from December 2018 to 2019, George's campaign finance reports showed a balance of $399, while his actual Chase Bank records showed over $37,000, suggesting the defendant used a roll-forward calculation that was used to hide discrepancies and underreport campaign contributions and expenses.

"In order for the money to be moved away from the bank account and for it not to be reported on the campaign finance report, and for the math to still work out on the roll-forward, the easiest way will be to make that money disappear at the beginning," Chi told jurors.

During opening statements on March 12, prosecutors alleged two various transfers were omitted from campaign reports, including one for over $30,000 and another for over $16,000.

George's attorneys argued on Monday that prosecutors had gaps of financial information before he ran for the county seat. Jared Woodfill, George's lead attorney, said Chi concluded her opinion on his client even though she was missing records.

"Don't you need to know what was reported in the first county treasurer race and whether it was required to be carried into each subsequent race in a report? Isn't that something you need to know?" Woodfill asked.

George’s defense team started calling witnesses to the stand Tuesday.