The driver in a fatal 2024 hit-and-run crash in Bethlehem was sentenced Thursday to state prison, Lehigh County District Attorney Gavin Holihan announced.<\/p>\n
Jose Vladmir Jerez, 25, of Allentown, pleaded guilty June 10<\/a> to felony counts of homicide by vehicle and leaving an accident involving death or personal injury, as well as to forgery in an unrelated case<\/a>.<\/p>\n Lehigh County Judge James Anthony sentenced Jerez to six to 17 years in state prison.<\/p>\n The crash occurred shortly before 6:50 p.m. Oct. 13, 2024<\/a>, in the 700 block of Central Boulevard in West Bethlehem.<\/p>\n Investigators said the victim, 20-year-old Ezequiel Hernandez-Cartagena, of Allentown, was at a park in Allentown with others when he got into a car driven by a man known only by the nickname Los Ten, later identified by authorities as Jerez.<\/p>\n Witnesses told police the car made an erratic movement during an attempt to pass another vehicle, struck a utility pole and went up an embankment.<\/p>\n “Jerez then fled the wreckage while the victim yelled for help and beeped the horn,” Holihan’s office said in a news release Thursday. “The witnesses then drove the victim to the hospital.”<\/p>\n Hernandez-Cartagena was pronounced dead that night at the hospital of his injuries.<\/p>\n Police said they found the car unoccupied and that it was registered to a Bethlehem woman, who they determined was not involved in the crash.<\/p>\n Investigators said they found blood in the car and that DNA testing linked Jerez to the vehicle. Police charged him in July 2025.<\/p>\n Bethlehem police officer Andrew DeFrank investigated the case, which was prosecuted by Chief Deputy District Attorney V. Paul Bernardino III.<\/p>\n more bethlehem area news<\/p>\n Read the original article on lehighvalleylive.com<\/a>. Add lehighvalleylive.com<\/a> as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The driver in a fatal 2024 hit-and-run crash in Bethlehem was sentenced Thursday to state prison, Lehigh County…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264937,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[119,153,155,154,111913,1218,111912,111911,433,111914,6798],"class_list":["post-264936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-allentown","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-ezequiel-hernandez-cartagena","tag-gavin-holihan","tag-james-anthony","tag-jose-vladmir-jerez","tag-lehigh-county","tag-personal-injury","tag-west-bethlehem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264936"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264936\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264937"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}