A Warminster man who fled to his native El Salvador last year after he was charged with sex crimes against children was extradited to Bucks County on Thursday to face trial for sexually assaulting three girls, including a 5-year-old authorities say he raped multiple times.
Noel Yanes, 45, is charged with rape, statutory sexual assault of a child, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, and related crimes.
Bucks County District Attorney Jen Schorn said Yanes’ arrest was a testament to the pursuit of justice for those who harm children.
“To those who commit crimes against the most vulnerable and believe they can evade accountability by fleeing across borders, this should serve as a clear message: You will be found, apprehended, and brought back to face the consequences of your actions,” she said.
After months of investigation into the case and Yanes’ whereabouts by local and federal authorities, he was arraigned in district court in Warminster early Thursday and remained in custody on 10% of $500,000 bail. There was no indication he had hired an attorney.
Investigators in Bucks County learned of the assaults in February 2024, when one of the girls told police Yanes had raped her multiple times at a home on Tollhouse Road in Warminster where he was living at the time, according to the affidavit of probable cause for his arrest. She said the assaults began when she was 5 years old and continued for six years.
A second girl told police Yanes groped her in Wildwood, at a park in Doylestown, and at the same Warminster home where the other girl said she was raped. She said the assaults began when she was 4 and continued for two years.
The third girl said Yanes sexually assaulted her when she was 8 years old as they swam together in a pool at a home in Warminster Township, the affidavit said. Yanes groped her while he was spinning her around, holding her by her ankles, she said, and he groped her twice more later in the day.
Yanes fled the country shortly after the charges against him were filed in February 2024. He was on the run there for 11 months before U.S. marshals received a tip about his whereabouts, and his capture was a collaboration between local prosecutors and the Department of Justice, officials said Thursday.
A North Philadelphia street-gang hit man wanted in connection with three killings, including the execution-style shooting of a 16-year-old boy, was taken into custody Wednesday morning in Delaware County, officials said.
Tyvine “Blumberg Eerd” Jones, 25, was apprehended by U.S. marshals in an apartment where he had been hiding at the Stratford Court complex in Lansdowne, authorities said. Jones was considered one of the city’s most wanted fugitives, and in October, marshals issued a $5,000 reward for information leading to his arrest.
Eric Gartner, the United States marshal for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, said Jones’ “unrestrained existence serves only to diminish our great city,” and his arrest demonstrates the agency’s commitment to keep Philadelphians safe.
Investigators say Jones is a suspect in three slayings that took place between 2020 and 2022: the killings of Heyward Garrison, 16, Wesley Rodwell, 20, and Ryan Findley, 23.
Jones is a self-identified member of the Blumberg gang, which federal prosecutors say operates in the area around the now-shuttered Norman Blumberg Apartments on Oxford Street in North Philadelphia.
Members of the gang, including its onetime leader, Edward Stinson, have been convicted of drug trafficking in that area, and others have been tied to assaults and shootings.
Stinson, federal prosecutors wrote in court filings, ran a round-the-clock crack cocaine distribution ring that sucked in teenagers, single mothers, and other vulnerable people.
Like Jones, Watson, 21, was sought by investigators as a suspect in Garrison’s killing, but he was gunned down in an unrelated shooting after a year on the run.
Garrison was found shot multiple times in the back of a Honda Pilot parked near 22nd and Diamond Streets in August 2020.
Two years later, in May 2022, Rodwell was slain on Erie Avenue near 16th Street in a broad-daylight shooting.
And in September 2022, Findley was killed on Creston Street near Oakland in Oxford Circle.
Investigators say Jones was involved in all three killings. When announcing the reward for his arrest, Supervisory Deputy U.S. Marshal Robert Clark called Jones “the very worst society has to offer” and said he demonstrated a complete disregard for human life.
A New York woman who worked as a “house mom” supervising troubled teens at a group home in Feasterville gave a 16-year-old boy money, posed in pictures with him holding a gun, and forced him into a sexual relationship, prosecutors in Bucks County said Tuesday.
Cristal Betancourt, 30, told the teen in text messages in December 2024 that she was pregnant and asked him to buy her an emergency contraceptive, according to the affidavit of probable cause for her arrest.
But the boy, in an electronic diary he kept on his iPhone’s Notes app, said he was afraid of Betancourt, writing that she was “crazy” and once demanded sex from him at gunpoint, the affidavit said.
Betancourt has been charged with institutional sexual assault, corruption of minors, and related crimes. She had not been arraigned as of Tuesday afternoon. Efforts to reach her were unsuccessful.
Investigators were first notified of the alleged abuse in January, six months after the teen was court-ordered to move into the home at 700 Ross Dr. in Feasterville.
The property, operated by Community Service Foundation, provides housing and behavioral therapy for troubled teens, usually after they are taken into custody for criminal offenses. It operates similar to a foster home, with a full-time “house parent” who lives on the premises and supervises the teens.
That supervisor also makes recommendations to CSF as to whether the teens are worthy of being granted “home passes” to visit family and friends.
CSF did not return a request for comment on Betancourt or the charges she faces.
Lower Southampton police were notified by investigators in Lancaster County, where the boy lived before being assigned to the group home, that they had a photo of the teen holding a Walther PPQ handgun and standing next to Betancourt, the affidavit said. Records show that she had purchased a gun similar to the one in the photo, the document said.
In an interview with investigators, the affidavit said, Betancourt told them she owned two handguns, including the Walther, which she said had been recently stolen from her car. She said she had not reported the gun stolen and asked detectives to do that for her, according to the document.
Detectives later examined the 16-year-old’s phone and found other photos of him holding both of Betancourt’s guns, the affidavit said. He told police she had taken him to a gun shop to look at firearms and then purchased a second gun, a Palmetto Arms 5.7-caliber pistol. Text messages found on the boy’s phone showed that he had bragged to his friends that he was carrying a handgun of that caliber, the document said.
The teen’s cell phone showed that he had taken detailed notes of his sexual encounters with Betancourt inside the group home in November 2024, according to the affidavit. He wrote that he no longer wanted to have sex with her but was afraid she would “get him in trouble” or harm him if he refused, the affidavit said.
Cell phone records revealed that Betancourt had taken the teen on unauthorized trips to Lancaster in violation of his probation, while lying and saying they were at a Costco store in Warminster, the document said, and detectives found she had sent him $600 via CashApp the week before Christmas 2024.
During a marathon preliminary hearing, held at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility due to security concerns, seven members of the Pagans were held over for trial by District Judge Marc Alfarano on charges including aggravated assault, conspiracy, riot, and reckless endangerment.
Those who appeared before Alfarano were: Joel Hernandez-Martinez, 36, George Hripto Jr., 50, and Jason Lawless, 45, all of Bridgeport; Manuel Baez-Santos, 34, of Norristown; Erik Dixon, 33, of King of Prussia; Luke Higgins, 29, of Dauberville; and Justin Noll, 34, of Reading.
Two other Pagans allegedly involved and facing similar charges in the incident, George Cwienk III, 51, of Bridgeport, and Erik Rosenberger, 46, of East Greenville, had their preliminary hearings continued due to a scheduling issue with their attorneys.
Assistant District Attorney Bradley Deckel said the group conspired to attack two members of the Unknown Bikers outlaw club after seeing them parked at the Wawa on Oct. 17.
Given the rules of their subculture, Deckel said, the Pagans felt they had no choice but to confront the rival club.
A gang expert testified Friday that the Pagans have a strong presence throughout Pennsylvania, and fiercely defend their territory.
“They knew what they had to do the moment they saw a group invading their territory,” Deckel said. “And they had to teach them a lesson with violence.”
But defense attorneys for the Pagans took turns sharply rebutting Deckel’s theory during the seven-hour hearing, arguing that their clients were not the ones responsible for the shooting. They asserted that prosecutors had built their case entirely on speculation and innuendo, unfairly painting their clients as dangerous in news coverage.
Further, they said, investigators could not clearly identify what role each of the nine men played in the supposed conspiracy to attack the other bikers, nor prove whether any of the Pagans were armed at the time.
Noll’s attorney, Robert J. Kirwan II, argued that the alleged targets in the case — the Unknown Bikers — were the ones who should be held accountable. Ballistics evidence showed 13 of the 14 bullets fired during the chaotic melee came from their guns.
He said he was “disgusted” that the men were not called to testify during Friday’s hearing.
“It’s astounding that the Unknown Bikers are not charged,” Kirwan said. “What we do know is that they unloaded all of their ammunition at the people present, including bystanders, and yet they’re walking free.”
After pulling into the Wawa just after 9 p.m., the Pagans encircled the other two bikers and began assaulting them. In turn, the Unknown Bikers opened fire on the Pagans with two 9mm handguns in what prosecutors described as an act of self-defense.
Three of the Pagans — Cwienk, Hernandez-Martinez, and Noll — were injured in the gunfire. Nearby, a man filling his tires with air was shot in the face as he dived for cover, and a woman smoking a cigarette outside the store was shot in the right side.
Deckel, the prosecutor, said that during the attack some members of the group strategically positioned their bikes at the gas station’s entrance, in what he described as an attempt to prevent their targets from escaping.
The Pagans’ defense attorneys denied that entirely, saying their clients were the true victims in the attack. Paul Lang, representing Dixon, said his client abandoned his motorcycle and fled as soon as the first gunshots rang out, despite the supposedly coordinated assault.
Still, Deckel said, the motive for the attack was clear: The Pagans wanted the Unknown Bikers’ “cuts,” their denim vests bearing the club logo. In the world of outlaw clubs, a biker’s cut is sacred and, therefore, a trophy sought by his rivals, according to a gang expert who testified Friday.
After the shooting, five of the Pagans were arrested during a car stop in Bridgeport. One of the motorcycles they were riding bore a bullet hole in its gas tank.
The other four were taken into custody in the following days, prosecutors said, tracked down through automated license plate readers and cell phone records.
The family of a Lower Pottsgrove Township man who was accused of beating his wife to death over the mounting cost of their cat’s veterinary care is suing Montgomery County and two medical companies, saying they denied him crucial healthcare while in the county jail, leading to his untimely death.
Barton Seltmann, 84, died in April 2024 from urosepsis from “an undiagnosed and untreated urinary tract infection,” according to the wrongful-death lawsuit, which was filed last week in federal court in Philadelphia.
A neck fracture that Seltmann sustained after falling in his jail cell also contributed to his death, the filing said.
The suit names the county, as well as PrimeCare Medical and Creative Health Services, two companies contracted to provide medical care to inmates at the jail.
Neither company responded to requests for comment. A spokesperson for the Montgomery County Board of Commissioners said the county does not comment on pending litigation.
In interviews after the incident, Seltmann, an Army veteran and former West Pottsgrove Township police officer, seemed to believe his wife was still alive, according to court filings. He did not grasp the reality of the incident and showed early signs of dementia.
A month before his death, a Montgomery County judge dismissed the case against Seltmann, ruling that he was not fit to stand trial because his mental-health faculties and physical condition had deteriorated so significantly.
But Patrick Duffy, the lawyer representing Seltmann’s children, wrote in the lawsuit that Seltmann’s marked decline in health came only while he was incarcerated.
“Despite the obvious signs and symptoms indicating worsening progression of his condition, Mr. Seltmann was denied adequate medical care and intervention which allowed his condition … to develop into a state where it was irreversible and no further care could prevent his death,” Duffy said.
The lawsuit asserts that jail staff did not allow Seltmann’s children to visit him due to the seriousness of the charges he faced at the time, which prevented his deteriorating health from being addressed sooner.
Staff at the prison, including medical providers from PrimeCare and Creative Health Services, made a “calculated decision” to delay providing Seltmann with more intensive treatment in hopes he would soon be transferred to Norristown State Hospital, the suit contends.
During intake at the jail, Seltmann appeared healthy, but by the end of his six weeks there, the lawsuit said, he was struggling to communicate, with “rambling and incoherent speech” and issues focusing.
Seltmann developed a fungal rash on his groin and injuries to his feet and legs that later made it difficult for him to walk, causing him to fall and injure his head.
In the suit, Duffy alleges that these issues were visible to, and known by, staff at the jail, but they refused to make a referral for him for outside care until his body temperature dropped to 86.5 degrees and he was retaining urine.
When Seltmann was taken to Einstein Montgomery Hospital on Jan. 11, 2024, doctors found he had an acute neck fracture from his previous falls at the jail.
He was later transferred to Jefferson Einstein Hospital in Olney, where he died months later.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy has asked the Indian government to extradite an accused murderer to South Jersey to face criminal charges in the death of a woman and her son in Maple Shade.
Narra and her son were found stabbed to death inside their home at the Fox Meadow Apartments in March 2017. The two suffered violent stab and slice wounds to their head and hands, and Anish was nearly decapitated in the attack, prosecutors said.
Hanumantha Rao Narra, Narra’s husband and the boy’s father, found the bodies, prosecutors said.
Investigators said Hameed waited until the woman and child were alone in the house before attacking them. Afterward, prosecutors said, Hameed fled to his native India and has remained there ever since.
In a letter to Vinay Kwatra, the Indian ambassador to America, Murphy said it was important that Hameed face justice.
“This heinous crime shocked our state, and for eight years investigators pursued every available lead,” the governor said.
“This request reflects not only the seriousness of the alleged offenses, but also the enduring spirit of cooperation between India and the United States in upholding the rule of law and combating violent crime.”
Sasikala Narra, 38, and her son, Anish, 6, were stabbed to death inside their apartment in Maple Shade in 2017.
In announcing the charges last month, Burlington County LaChia Bradshaw said Hameed worked at the same company as Hanumantha Rao Narra, and lived near the family in their apartment complex. For weeks before the killings, Bradshaw said, Hameed “stalked” the family and took measures to hide his movements.
She declined to describe the potential motive for the slayings.
Local, state, and federal investigators worked the case for nearly a decade, and ultimately connected Hameed to the crime through a single drop of blood they say he left at the crime scene.
Last year, a sample of Hameed’s DNA was finally obtained when the company Hameed works for shipped his personal laptop to South Jersey. DNA found on the computer matched the blood found at the crime scene in 2017, according to investigators.
A Pottstown man who shot an officer in the leg with his own firearm during a scuffle last year was sentenced Tuesday to 22½ to 45 years in state prison.
William Ciccoli Jr., 43, showed little emotion as he learned his fate, shaking his head as Montgomery County Court Judge Thomas DelRicci handed down his sentence.
The judge told Ciccoli he was shocked by his “lack of remorse and accountability.”
“We all saw the video, yet you claim the ‘gun went off,’” DelRicci said. “It went off because of the defendant’s actions. No other reason.”
After the hearing, Ciccoli denied pulling the trigger on Cpl. Anthony Fischer’s sidearm as they grappled inside Ciccoli’s apartment in November 2024.
“If I disarmed him, my prints would’ve been on that gun,” he said. “I just feel sorry for my family for what has happened, that is all.”
When pressed, Ciccoli said he feels sorry for Fischer, but insisted that he did not shoot him.
Ciccoli’s attorney, Frank Genovese, said he wasn’t surprised by the sentence, which he said he would appeal.
In June, a jury convicted Ciccoli of assault on a law enforcement officer and related crimes, but acquitted him of attempted murder, ruling that he did not intend to kill Fischer when he fired the gun.
Fischer went to Ciccoli’s home on Chestnut Street to respond to a report of a domestic-violence dispute between him and his girlfriend, prosecutors said. While speaking with the officers, Ciccoli became combative and fought with Fischer.
During the scuffle, Ciccoli wedged his hand into the holster on Fischer’s hip and pulled the trigger on his department-issued .40-caliber handgun, according to bodycam footage played during Ciccoli’s trial in June. During the video, Fischer yells “he’s going for my gun,” shortly before a single gunshot rings out.
The shot struck Fischer in his leg, nicking his femoral artery and causing severe injuries that the officer said still prevent him from moving without pain.
District Attorney Kevin Steele, who prosecuted the case, said Tuesday he appreciated that the judge “recognized the seriousness of the case.”
“I think it’s very important for everyone to understand that if you try to disarm a police officer, if you shoot at a police officer you’re going to jail for 20 years,” Steele said, adding that Ciccoli’s repeated profession of innocence is “nonsense.”
“This is a guy that’s not taking accountability for his actions,” Steele said. “We’re here because of his actions.”
Tyler Ramaley wakes up every morning grateful that he’s able to do “respectable work in a hardhat” as he clocks in for his shift at JGM, a steel fabrication plant in Coatesville.
Nineteen months ago, that would have been impossible: He was struggling with an opioid addiction and waking up to a monotonous routine in a Chester County Prison cell.
A new program offered at the jail, Exit, Enter, Employ, gave him an opportunity to move on from his past mistakes. He had help building his resume, getting certified in his chosen field, and, crucially, landing an interview for a job that was waiting for him after his release.
“I was in there, and I just didn’t like who I was and I just knew I needed to change,” Ramaley, 37, said in an interview during a break from running a plasma cutter on a recent day. “It gave me a purpose to wake up every day, and it makes me not want to waste the opportunity I’ve been given.”
Ramaley’s experience, county officials say, is just one of many success stories to come out of the E3 program since its inception in January 2023 through a partnership between the jail and the Chester County Intermediate Unit.
More than 100 people have graduated from the course, with a recidivism rate of 2%, according to Jill Stoltzfus, the program’s career-readiness coordinator and a CCIU employee.
“Everybody needs a second chance,” she said. “And I’m very candid with people when I interview them. Like, we’ve all made mistakes, I’m sure I’ve made mistakes that I could be in the same situation.”
More than 100 inmates at the Chester County Prison have graduate from the E3 program since its inception in January 2023.
Job-readiness programs are nothing new for county jails — they’re offered almost universally across the region. But Stoltzfus said E3 is different because it provides a direct path, with job openings already lined up for graduating inmates from multiple companies that partner with the county.
And in the first few months in those jobs, coordinators from the program follow up with former inmates, checking in to see how they are faring.
“I don’t like the judgment we often hear of ‘Why should we fund this?’ or the idea that some people deserve a chance over others,” Stoltzfus said. “I think it’s crucial that we at least put that opportunity out to them.”
E3 is available only to inmates who have been sentenced to county jail, meaning their crimes were not serious enough to warrant state prison time. And county officials carefully screen those who apply to the program to make sure they are ready.
Besides workforce skills like OSHA certification and courses in customer service, E3 offers financial-planning advice, as well as cognitive behavioral therapy and anger management.
Current partner employers, besides JGM, include J.P. Mascaro & Sons, FASTSIGNS, and MacKissic. Stoltzfus is hoping to expand the offerings to include agricultural and culinary posts.
Howard Holland, the warden of Chester County Prison, views the program as a way to help incarcerated people prepare to reenter society in a productive way.
“We’re engaging them in a way other than just ‘Here’s your cot, stay behind the bars,’” he said. “You just have that same cycle over and over and over again because that’s the way our institutions are run.
“At the end of the day, we’re humans, right?” he added. “They’re here, and it’s our responsibility to, while they’re here, try to do the best we can for them.”
Tyler Ramaley said he never thought he would be able to go to work, after years of addiction. The E3 program helped him connect with a job he loves.
Ramaley, who was named JGM’s employee of the month in June, said the opportunity was an important step toward reversing years of bad decisions.
His drug abuse, he said, began in 2020, when he was injured on the job while running a hammer drill at a concrete mill. The drill skipped and jerked his arm hard, shredding multiple tendons. After several surgeries, he said, he was prescribed Tramadol in bottles of 150 pills at a time. He became reliant on the pills, using them to deal with the pain.
And when his workers’ comp ran out, he said, his doctor cut him off cold turkey and he turned to other ways to support his opioid habit and purchase drugs, racking up convictions for theft and forgery and landing in county jail.
His moment of clarity came this spring, he said, and he graduated from E3 in April, weeks before his jail sentence ended and he was released.
“When I was in my active addiction, I never thought I would be able to go to work and not be on something,” he said, “and there’s times I’ll stand out there and just kind of think about how happy I am here, actually doing hard work and respectable work and doing it the right way.
“And that’s a better feeling than anything I had when I was in my addiction.”
A former Bensalem resident who spent two years in state prison for abusing his infant son is now charged with the boy’s murder after police say complications from the injuries he inflicted more than a decade ago caused the boy’s death.
Kyle Hinkle, 38, who now lives in Allentown, was charged Monday with third-degree murder in the death of his son, Leonardo, who was 11 when he died in August 2024.
After the child’s death was ruled a homicide earlier this year, investigators in Bucks County spent months gathering medical records and other evidence to link it to the injuries he received as an infant.
Hinkle remained in custody, in lieu of 10% of $2 million bail. There was no indication he had hired an attorney.
Investigators first learned of the abuse in October 2012, when the boy was taken to Jefferson Torresdale Hospital with severe head injuries, according to the affidavit of probable cause for Hinkle’s arrest.
Doctors there determined the injuries had been intentionally inflicted to the then-3-month-old, and a CAT scan revealed signs of similar, older injuries that were still healing, the affidavit said.
The boy’s grandmother told detectives that on an earlier occasion, she had seen bruises on the child’s arm that matched a necklace Hinkle used to wear, indicating he may have struck the boy with it.
In an interview with detectives, Hinkle admitted he shook the baby vigorously without supporting his head out of frustration because he would not stop crying.
The injuries left the child wheelchair-bound, nonverbal, and reliant on a feeding tube, according to prosecutors.
Hinkle pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and endangering the welfare of a child in 2013. He served two years in state prison, followed by three years of probation, court records show.
In the intervening years, the boy and his mother moved to Oliver, Fayette County, southeast of Pittsburgh.
When the child died in 2024, the Fayette County coroner ruled his death a homicide, saying, in a statement, that complications from living with Shaken Baby Syndrome directly led to his death.
The former chief financial officer of a Burlington County nonprofit was sentenced to eight years in state prison for stealing $2.5 million from the company for personal expenses, including settling her credit card debt and buying vacation homes and a Corvette Stingray sports car, officials said Thursday.
Colleen Witten, 56, of Buena, Atlantic County, pleaded guilty in June to theft, money laundering, and tax evasion for the scheme, which took place during her time as an executive with OTC Services, a company that provides job training for adults with disabilities.
New Jersey State Attorney General Matthew Platkin said Witten’s prosecution reflects his office’s “unbreakable commitment to pursue justice for victims and hold accountable those who abuse their positions of trust to commit crimes.”
Witten’s attorney, Brendan Kavanagh, did not immediately return a request for comment.
Prosecutors said Witten altered corporate board meeting minutes to give herself the authority to open a company bank account, and then used the account to siphon money between May 2019 and March 2024.
She disguised the theft by laundering the money through checks issued to a landscaping business she owned with her husband, and the couple failed to pay taxes on these funds.
Witten’s husband, Allan, pleaded guilty earlier this year to one count of receiving stolen property for accepting money from the nonprofit for work he knew his business did not perform. He was sentenced to three years in state prison.
