{"id":654797,"date":"2026-05-07T04:53:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T04:53:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/654797\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T04:53:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T04:53:10","slug":"mobile-couple-accused-of-using-children-in-fake-football-fundraiser-during-custody-dispute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/654797\/","title":{"rendered":"Mobile couple accused of using children in fake football fundraiser during custody dispute"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">MOBILE, Ala. (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.fox10tv.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">WALA<\/a>) &#8211; A Mobile couple is behind bars in Indiana, accused of using children in what investigators describe as a football fundraiser scam while at the center of a custody battle that spanned multiple states.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Andrew and Amanda Peyregne are being held in Knox County, Indiana, charged with two counts each of contributing to the delinquency of a minor and two counts of theft. The arrests follow a multi-state search that began after Amanda allegedly took four children across state lines following a custody order.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Court records in Mobile County show Amanda is named in a custody case filed by James Sweeney, the father of two of the children. Sweeney said he was granted emergency temporary custody of his two children on April 1.<\/p>\n<p>Alleged scheme involved children in uniform<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Sweeney said the couple dressed children in football uniforms and sent them to businesses claiming they were raising money for football equipment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cThey dress them up in football uniforms and they go to businesses claiming they\u2019re doing a fundraiser for football equipment and from what I understand they\u2019ve gotten quite a sum of money for doing this,\u201d Sweeney said. \u201cThey even had flyers, a speech they had the kids memorize.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Multi-state search tracked through social media<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Court filings say shortly after being served with custody papers, Amanda left Mobile with her husband and all four children, including Sweeney\u2019s two kids. Sweeney said Amanda sent him a message saying she was taking them on a \u201cfinal trip.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Sweeney said he tracked their movements through Snapchat.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI was actually tracking them through Snapchat. She didn\u2019t turn her Snapchat location off thank God,\u201d Sweeney said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Court records show Sweeney tracked their movements through several states.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cTennessee, Virginia, Ohio, Indiana. And Indiana is where everything kind of stopped,\u201d Sweeney said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The filings allege authorities in Virginia served Amanda with the Alabama paperwork, but she left the state and didn\u2019t appear for a hearing there. She and Andrew were then arrested in Indiana after police say they used children in a football fundraiser scam.<\/p>\n<p>Father describes unsafe conditions<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Sweeney said the safety of his children was his primary concern during the search.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWorried about my kids. They were traveling in a crew cab truck. There was only five seatbelts. There was six people, two dogs,\u201d Sweeney said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">He said the children were not attending school and were living in motels and out of a truck.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cThey obviously weren\u2019t going to school, hopping from motel to motel, living out of a truck, sitting at Walmarts or different locations that had free wifi,\u201d Sweeney said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Sweeney said his two children are now back home with him. The other two children belong to Andrew and Amanda. It is not exactly clear where they are.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 WALA. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MOBILE, Ala. (WALA) &#8211; A Mobile couple is behind bars in Indiana, accused of using children in what&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":654798,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-654797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654797\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}