Children, pot found in car after chase, police say
STROUDSBURG, MONROE COUNTY (WBRE/WYOU) — A man is on the run and a woman is facing several charges after police say they found children in a car with pot after a chase in Monroe County Sunday.
According to court documents, on Sunday at about 11:10 p.m., a state trooper was driving east on State Route 611 in Stroudsburg when they saw a silver Mercedes traveling in front of them.
State police say the car was seen swerving on the road and driving above the posted speed limit.
The trooper then activated their emergency lights and attempted to pull the car over.
After an extended period of time, troopers say the car eventually pulled over on North 9th Street and Terrance Drive behind a gas station.
Upon approach to the car, troopers say a child was seen in the trunk of the vehicle.
Authorities explained that troopers approached the car and made contact with the driver, Charles Terry, 48, of Henryville, and the passenger, Alexis Cedeno, 34, of Stroudsburg.
Troopers say they smelled a strong odor of marijuana coming from Terry's breath.
PA Congressman spoke to Schuylkill County business leaders about tariffs
When asked by the trooper why it took so long to pull their vehicle over, Terry related that he was pulling into the gas station, according to court documents.
The trooper asked Terry why his child was in the trunk of the car.
Terry responded, saying, 'Because I just bought this car,' and related that he didn't have enough room for his children, according to PSP.
Troopers say Terry then turned the key in the ignition, put the car in drive, and a pursuit was initiated.
Turning out of the gas station, the car was pursued by the trooper as they took a left onto Pocono Commons Drive.
The trooper stopped the pursuit due to their identification of the driver and children being inside the car at the time.
While following at a distance, the trooper says they momentarily lost sight of the car before seeing it again, slowly traveling straight on Mountaineer Drive.
Seeing the car slow down, state police say the trooper pulled behind the Mercedes with lights still activated and demanded the driver to get out of the vehicle.
Anti-gang efforts in NEPA target youth
That's when Cedeno stepped out of the driver's seat of the car, according to PSP.
Police say Cedeno told them that Terry 'bailed' from the car on Mountaineer Drive.
After being read her rights, troopers say Cedeno spoke to them, explaining that they were traveling from Indiana and made stops in Pittsburgh and Ohio using Interstate 80.
Troopers noted in court documents that Interstate 80 is a 'main drug corridor' used to move drugs from point A to point B.
While at the car, state police saw about eight mason jars with suspected marijuana in plain view in the back seat where a child was sitting on top of.
When troopers asked Cedeno about the jars, she denied marijuana being in the jars, saying 'I just bought those at the dollar store,' and explained she bought the jars in Pittsburgh in a pack of 12, according to court records.
Victim in fatal crash identified as local councilman
Troopers say they then asked for consent to search the vehicle, which Cedeno granted and was told that at any point she wanted them to stop, she would need to notify the state police on scene.
From the car, troopers say they confiscated eight mason jars containing suspected marijuana and one small potted suspected marijuana plant.
Court documents noted that when authorities were speaking to Cedeno, they smelled the odor of alcohol on her and her breath.
Due to her being a flight risk, Cedeno took a 'Preliminary Breath Test', which indicated an alcohol presence of 0.100, according to PSP.
Cedeno told state police she did have 'a couple of shots' in Indiana earlier in the evening.
According to court documents, Cedeno was arraigned Monday morning before Magisterial District Judge Phillip R. Riley.
Authorities say Cedeno's bail was posted and has a preliminary hearing scheduled for June 4.
Cedeno has been charged with endangering the welfare of children, driving under the influence of alcohol or a controlled substance, and other related charges.
Meanwhile, troopers say Terry is at large and has a warrant out for his arrest.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Miami Herald
12 hours ago
- Miami Herald
Broward businessman sentenced to 23 years after swindling Haitian investors
A South Florida moving company owner convicted of swindling millions of dollars from thousands of investors — including nurses, school teachers and military veterans — was sentenced to 23 years in prison on Friday in Fort Lauderdale federal court. Sanjay Singh, 45, borrowed hundreds of millions from the mostly working-class investors with promises of paying them double-digit returns and ownership of the trucks in his company, Royal Bengal Logistics Inc. In the end, about 2,000 investors — many of Haitian descent — fell for Singh's sales pitch and lost $54 million in what federal prosecutors described as a 'Ponzi scheme' that warranted 25 years in prison. In November, a 12-person jury unanimously found Royal Bengal's former president guilty of conspiring with other employees, wire fraud and money laundering. On Friday, U.S. District Judge David Leibowitz condemned Singh as a 'huckster' who lied to victims while raising $158 million between 2020 and 2023 for his Coral Springs company. After sentencing him, the judge scheduled a restitution hearing for June 26. A 66-year-old victim wrote a letter filed in court describing how he had to come out of retirement after losing his life savings. 'Mr. Singh, if you are not aware, and just like you, my wife and many others you duped are immigrants who came to the US to further our education and/or seek a better life,' wrote the victim, whose name was redacted. 'You stole our happiness, our retirement, our financial freedom, and our money that we entrusted you with.' 'Lying, lying, lying' At trial, prosecutors Roger Cruz and Robert Moore said Singh stole tens of millions from investors and lied to them about how he spent their money; instead, they said, he used the proceeds to buy a Mercedes, renovate his Coral Springs home and play the stock market as a day trader, squandering millions of the victims' investments. 'He was just lying, lying, lying — gambling in the stock market,' Moore told jurors during closing arguments at trial. 'He knew his company wasn't making any money, and he knew he was lying. ... This was a Titanic. This was a sinking ship.' After Singh was found guilty by the Fort Lauderdale jury in November, the judge allowed him to remain free on a $1 million bond. But the prosecutors urged Leibowitz to cancel his bond based on allegations that he could flee to his native India, especially as he faced potentially decades in prison. They wrote that Singh 'has the means and incentive to flee pending sentencing, and a history of deceiving this Court.' Judge Leibowitz sided with the prosecutors and revoked Singh's bond. Since mid-November, he's been held at a Broward County jail that doubles as a federal-lockup. Singh's assistant federal public defenders, Abigail Becker and Victor Van Dyke, sought a lower sentence at Friday's hearing, to no avail. They portrayed him at trial as a hard-working family man who made mistakes in building his business, but he didn't intentionally mislead anyone, lie to his company's investors or commit fraud. 'It's a story of a man who grew his business from zero trucks to 200 trucks with revenue of $18 million in three years,' Van Dyke told jurors, arguing Singh didn't live lavishly. 'This case is about trucks, not Ferraris.' In a separate Securities and Exchange Commission civil complaint, Singh and his company were accused of fraudulently raising money from investors through unregistered securities and related anti-fraud violations. As a result of the enforcement action, Singh lost control of his company in June 2023. A federal judge froze Singh's and the firm's assets, including bank accounts and real estate, and appointed the Fort Lauderdale law firm Tripp Scott as Royal Bengal's receiver to work on recovering money for investors. Many of them invested between $25,000 and $250,000 in Singh's company. In South Florida, such cases are increasingly common. For decades, the region has been known as the nation's con capital for its healthcare, income-tax and credit-card scams — not to mention high-end Ponzi schemes orchestrated by such notorious figures as the late Wall Street financier Bernard Madoff and disbarred Fort Lauderdale lawyer Scott Rothstein. Preying on Haitian Americans But South Florida has also become home to 'affinity fraud,' authorities say, where investment schemers prey on unsuspecting immigrants and other minorities who tend to trust the perpetrators because they either know them or someone else who vouches for them. The Haitian-American community has been hit particularly hard, but so have immigrants from Cuba, Colombia and Venezuela. In the Singh case, the former head of Royal Bengal was accused of conspiring with other employees, including Haitian Americans, to offer high-yield investments, promising mostly working-class people in the Haitian diaspora to use their money to expand operations and increase the company's fleet to 200 semi-trucks and trailers, as well as build a maintenance facility in Lubbock, Texas. Singh assured investors that his company was generating $650,000 to $1 million a month in revenue between 2019 and 2023 — and that their investments were safe and growing in value, according to court records and the FBI. During a November 2022 investor Zoom video conference, Singh boasted that Royal Bengal was a better company than Apple and Tesla. 'Better than Tesla' 'The fundamentals of this business can be trusted,' Singh said during the presentation. 'So let's move on from the point of view that [Royal] Bengal may last one day, two days — this is not Bitcoin. Our product is better than Apple. Our product is better than Tesla. You buy Apple, you buy Tesla, you start spending money. You buy [a] Royal Bengal [investment] contract, you start making money.' SEC investigators said Singh and Royal Bengal used tens of millions of dollars of new investors' funds to make Ponzi-like payments to old investors — until the purported business model collapsed due to operating losses of $18 million since 2019. The SEC complaint named Singh and his former company itself as defendants. Also, Singh's wife, Sheetal, and Constantina Celicourt, the spouse of the firm's former vice president of business development, were named as relief defendants. (Her husband, Ricardi Celicourt, who public records show was a Royal Bengal executive, was not named in the SEC lawsuit.) Singh's wife, Sheetal, and Constantina Celicourt were not charged with any wrongdoing, but the SEC sued them to collect proceeds that authorities say they received from Singh's alleged Ponzi scheme. If the SEC and federal prosecutors prevail in their parallel cases, it is likely that Singh, his company, his wife, and Celicourt will be required to pay back the money they're accused of stealing from the Haitian-American investors and other victims of the investment scam. After his conviction in November, Singh informed the SEC in Miami that he and his wife wanted to settle the agency's claims, SEC trial lawyer Russell O'Brien wrote in a court filing last month. Now that Singh has been sentenced, the next step is to meet with the couple to finalize the terms of any settlement, O'Brien said.
Yahoo
12 hours ago
- Yahoo
Max Verstappen must control his road rage to cement his legacy as a great
There was no justification for Max Verstappen's rash and futile act of retribution at the Spanish Grand Prix, when he deliberately drove into the side of George Russell's car. The world champion knows it and on Monday admitted as much with something of a mea culpa on social media. Yet it also must be considered that it is part and parcel of what makes Verstappen so competitive, albeit in this case in an entirely unedifying and self-defeating fashion. Angry and frustrated at a sequence of events in Barcelona, including having to cede a place to Russell, Verstappen surrendered to his baser instincts. Having pulled over to give the place to Russell, he clearly then felt a point had to be made and accelerated back up the inside to collide with the Mercedes. Advertisement Related: 'Not right': Verstappen issues veiled apology for Russell crash at F1 Spanish GP He took a 10-second penalty, dropping him to 10th putting him 49 points behind title leader Oscar Piastri and had three points added to his licence. One more penalty and he will receive a one-race ban. He conceded on Monday that he was 'frustrated', his emotions were running high and that the move was 'not right and shouldn't have happened'. Clearly he had had time to cool down and put some perspective on what was a moment of madness, but even given the chain of events – which were still hardly rage-inducing stuff – this was still shocking from an F1 veteran at 27-years-old and a four-time world champion. Advertisement It was the purposeless anger that really caught the eye, rather than the severity of the action itself. The Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff described it as 'incomprehensible' and his interpretation of it in the immediate aftermath bears repeating. 'The great ones, whether it's in motor racing or in other sports, you just need to have the world against you and perform at the highest possible level,' he said. 'That's why sometimes these greats don't recognise that actually the world is not against you, it's just you who has made a mistake or you've screwed up.' Verstappen has displayed this attitude in the past, while his Red Bull team have at times positively cultivated the 'us-against-the-world' stance, with their contention they have never been quite taken seriously because they are backed by an energy drink manufacturer. Advertisement Verstappen has also been clear in the past that he believes the rules around overtaking are over-prescriptive and this too doubtless fed into his frustration. He was similarly aggrieved in Mexico last season when he was penalised twice for two rash manoeuvres on the same lap against Lando Norris. 'What is allowed, what isn't, is not very natural,' he said on Sunday, in reference to the regulations. However, even given that antipathy, it is hard not to sense that the driver who can be as controlled and composed as they come, who will grind out a result from nowhere, who has been dragging his recalcitrant car by scruff of the neck to the front of the grid this season, can sometimes simply succumb to a base, emotive response that is really beneath him but which he cannot seem to quite always suppress. Which is disappointing, because Wolff is also correct in identifying Verstappen as one of the greats. He may be flawed but he is without doubt an exceptional driver, a generational talent. His uncompromising attitude, drive and competitive spirit inform part of what makes him so good and so hard to beat but on Sunday those attributes went unrestrained to his cost. He shares those ultra-competitive traits with others, perhaps notably Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna but there is also a fundamental difference. When Schumacher ruthlessly and deliberately clashed with Damon Hill at Adelaide in 1994 and then Jacques Villeneuve at Jerez in 1997, he had a specific purpose in mind – the moves were with the intent of winning the world championship. Similarly, Senna taking out Alain Prost at Suzuka in 1990. Cynical, ruthless, ugly and unsportsmanlike without doubt but notably with purpose. Advertisement Nigel Mansell recalls that Senna's uncompromising attitude was aimed expressly at intimidating other drivers. Verstappen's wild lunge at Russell in Spain was none of these things. It served no end other than to vent his own anger and has left his title hopes hanging by the slenderest of threads. Worse still it coloured what has otherwise been an enormously impressive season in which he has stayed with the McLarens with immense determination and consistency, taking every opportunity and returning the maximum when he had none. This moment of madness was a pointless flailing that rendered those efforts all but futile and while he maintains he was never really in the title fight, his fearsome efforts thus far this season belie that claim because for all the rightful opprobrium from Sunday, Verstappen is better and more than the driver who gave in to his emotions. His legacy as a potentially great champion depends on him proving that.
Yahoo
18 hours ago
- Yahoo
It was not right – Max Verstappen takes blame for crash with George Russell
Max Verstappen has issued a veiled apology for his wild crash with George Russell by admitting it 'was not right and should have not happened'. The four-time world champion was hit with a 10-second penalty by the stewards for causing a collision with Russell with two laps remaining of Sunday's Spanish Grand Prix. Advertisement Russell said he felt Verstappen's move was deliberate and accused the Red Bull driver of letting himself down. He also suggested that Verstappen should have been disqualified for the crash. Verstappen refused to accept blame for the coming together after the race and even sarcastically offered Russell a tissue after he was informed of his British rival's criticism. However, in a message posted on social media on Monday, Verstappen said: 'We had an exciting strategy and good race in Barcelona, till the safety car came out. 'Our tyre choice to the end and some moves after the safety car restart fuelled my frustration, leading to a move that was not right and shouldn't have happened. Advertisement 'I always give everything out there for the team and emotions can run high. You win some together, you lose some together. See you (at the next race) in Montreal.' Verstappen, who was on the slower hard tyre compound, lost third place to Charles Leclerc after he opened the door to the Ferrari driver when he made a mistake on the exit of the final corner in a six-lap shootout to the flag following the deployment of a safety car. Russell then attempted to sling his Mercedes underneath Verstappen's Red Bull at the first corner before the Dutchman took to the escape road and remained ahead of the Briton. Advertisement 'Max, can you let Russell through, please?' said Verstappen's race engineer, Gianpiero Lambiase. 'What? I was ahead, mate. What the f***! He just ran me off the road.' Verstappen slowed down at turn five to allow Russell past, but then accelerated and drove into his rival's Mercedes. 'What the f***'?' Russell said on the radio. Verstappen later moved out of Russell's way and crossed the line in fifth. However, he was hit with a timed penalty by the stewards – demoting him to 10th – and also punished with three penalty points on his licence which leaves him just one point away from a race ban. He now trails championship leader Oscar Piastri by 49 points in the standings. Mercedes' George Russell said he felt Max Verstappen's move was 'deliberate' (Bradley Collyer/PA) It marked another controversial chapter in Verstappen's career following run-ins last year with Lando Norris and multiple clashes with Lewis Hamilton in their title duel four years ago. Advertisement Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff, who has been linked with a move for Verstappen, said: 'I don't know exactly what the motivations were and I don't want to jump on it and say it was road rage, but it wasn't nice. 'The great ones, whether it's in motor racing or in other sports, you just need to have the world against you and perform at the highest possible level. 'That's why sometimes these greats don't recognise that actually the world is not against you, it's just you who has made a mistake or screwed up.'
