Mezzacappa Faces Criminal Charges For Hiding Assets

This all started on Halloween 2011. At that time, I published a hard-hitting story called Beware the Wicked Witch of Easton. At that time, a strange and little-known woman named Tricia Mezzacappa was running for West Easton Borough Council. I wanted to warn people what she's really like. She responded by unleashing a torrent of defamation, false claims and bogus PFAs in an attempt to discredit me. Nearly four years later, she's still doing it. Along the way, she has lost three races for elective office. Undaunted, she's running for borough council again. But now she's facing new criminal charges. That should throw a monkey wrench into her quest. It should prevent her from getting a License to Carry Firearms. It may even have an adverse impact on her nursing license.

As most of you know, I have a judgment against Mezzacappa now valued at more than $70,500. I have filed something called a writ of execution against her personal property, This is a court document that directs the Sheriff to levy on and sell items of personal property to satisfy what is owed. In some counties, the Sheriff will actually impound these items until the sale. In Northampton County, though, the Sheriff usually just prepares a list of items that can be sold and schedules a sale.

Pursuant to this writ, the Sheriff made several efforts to serve Mezzacappa. But she made that impossible. She refused to answer the door. When a Deputy confronted her in argument court one day, she was evasive and still refused to schedule an appointment. She even disappeared for a time, and hid her car.

Unfortunately for her, her car was spotted in early December. It was seen by a West Easton resident, after a snowstorm, sitting in an alleyway about a block from her home. Sheriffs were notified. They immediately levied on her car. In addition to posting the car, they also posted a notice of the levy at her house, and scheduled a sale of the car - 2008 black Toyota RAV-4 with about 43,000 miles - for January 23. The levy included a notice, warning Mezzacappa not to move the car without permission from the Sheriffs.

Mezzacappa disregarded this notice and immediately hid the car. This is a crime. It's called defrauding a secured creditor, and it's a misdemeanor of the second degree.

This means she could go to jail for as long as two years and be fined as much as $5,000.

I wrote to Mezzacappa, asking her to return the car immediately. "Keep lookin'", she responded.

On January 23, the sale was conducted, and I bought her car for $1. She did not appear. Sheriffs went out to get the RAV-4 at the location where it was originally levied. Of course, it was gone. That day, I received this anonymous comment on my blog: "Face facts, you will never see a penny of that judgement [sic]. The circle of corruption only hits lucky once a day. Take that word of advice and stop making such as ass out of yourself."

Mezzacappa was obviously taunting me. But she also was thumbing her nose at the courts. "[T]the incompetents can't even find a rav4," an anonymous comment on my blog stated.

Sheriffs reported to the District Attorney's Office that Mezzacappa was defying court process. District Attorney John Morganelli, who has previously authorized complaints filed by constables against people who move levied assets, assigned Detective Frank Jordan to conduct an investigation. Mezzacappa regularly ignores certified mail and notices from the sheriff's office, so she ignored Detective Jordan when he made repeated attempts to contact her.

Big mistake.

Yesterday, Detective Jordan charged Mezzacappa with defrauding a secured creditor. Though her taunting and complete lack of cooperation provide a basis for arresting her, Magisterial District Judge Richard Yetter is playing it safe and issued a summons, along with a fingerprint order. 

This is just Mezzacappa's latest run-in with the law. In 2012, she was convicted of disorderly conduct after a West Easton Borough Hall tirade in which she twice threatened to "fucking drag [Council President Kelly Gross] to the river and drown her... ." The following year, she was convicted of harassing a hapless boro clerk who was so upset by the garbage spewed by Mezzacappa that she found employment elsewhere.  Mezzacappa's taunts of this clerk are still on her blog, to which I refuse to link.

In addition to her borough hall antics, she penned a disturbing letter to the editor in 2013 defending Rockne Newell, who is accused of shooting up a nearby Ross Township meeting that killed three people. Likening the "oppression" of him to what she strangely thinks is happening to her in West Easton, Mezzacappa writes, "I thank the Lord that I have had the patience to continue putting up with this tyranny."

In 2013, Mezzacappa posted this comment at Lehigh Valley Live three times.

Tricia Mezzacappa
Hi Jimp, I dont usually respond to anons, but here it goes.
Maybe I'M scared, but I dont think I'm paranoid, or a gun nut. See, law enforcement doesnt always work for insignificant nobody's like myself. They dont always serve and protect, either. When armagedon comes a runnin towards my house, I stand armed and ready. I picture armegedon about 5 ft 9 and balding, little eyeglasses on the tip of his nose, and enough fat flaps to insulate a bull. Deep breath, aim, shoot, and....one hollow point goes right through his skull, he's dead before he hit the ground, kersplat....PERFECT

I happen to be 5'9", balding, do wear my glasses towards the tip of my rather substantial nose and have enough fat flaps to insulate several bulls, a few sea lions and the entire Becahi basketball team. Her account was suspended, but she continues to make outrageous attacks like that under numerous pseudonyms.

Interestingly, Mezzacappa herself claims that an Allentown psychiatrist who has read her blog entries has declared her "an immediate and imminent danger to society, and one that needs emergency mental health treatment." She claims I procured that opinion, although the first I heard about it is from her own entry.

I do consider Mezzacappa violent, dangerous and dishonest. But I believe that her criminal behavior is the result of mental illness. She might be an appropriate candidate for the Mental Health Court recently created in Northampton County. But I doubt she realizes she is her own worst enemy.

Having purchased Mezzacappa's car at a Sheriff's sale, my next step will be to obtain a title from PennDOT and then to report the vehicle stolen. Now we're talking felony. Seven years in the can. fines of up to $15,000.

I realize Mezzacappa would rather drive her car over a cliff than surrender it, but I intend to pursue every remedy available to ensure that she pays what she owes. If she'd rather go to jail than do the right thing, that's OK with me.