Jeep

The swirling saga of a fatal hit-and-run, a legislator's Jeep and an "other woman" continues to churn in the state Capitol as investigators expand their probe to others at the seat of government. A so-called mystery woman who police plan to interview about the accident and Rep. Thomas W. Druce's state-leased Jeep says she was with the lawmaker at a popular bar near the Capitol the night of the accident. But she said she knows "nothing" about the accident and was not in the Jeep.

Vernon Mills says he normally does not let anyone drive his 1987 Jeep. But when John Anderson, 18, of Glassboro, N.J., began bugging him on Feb. 4, pleading to take the wheel, Mills, 17, said he reluctantly agreed. He let Anderson drive after arriving in North Philadelphia, searching for a drug dealer to make a buy. "When Anderson got in the driver's seat, he went crazy," said Assistant District Attorney Randolph Williams. Anderson ran three red lights and, at 2nd and York streets, rammed another car, killing a 3-year-old girl, the prosecutor said.

A South Philadelphia man who was heading home on the Blue Route Sunday night died when his Jeep skidded into a slow-traveling snow plow in Ridley Township, state police said. Charles Francis "Buddy" Wray 3d, 23, was killed instantly in the crash, police said. Robert E. Carl, 53, of the first block of Wartman Road, Collegeville, was driving the 1972 Diamond plow truck about 25 m.p.h. and was not injured, police said. Wray had moved into the South Philadelphia home a little over a year ago to take care of his wheelchair-bound grandfather, family members said.

The driver of the getaway Jeep involved in a 2008 bank robbery and killing of a Philadelphia police sergeant was so intent on getting away that he nearly ran over a man walking a dog and just missed colliding with a van carrying a man and his 8-year-old son. The van driver, Michael Nastasiak, yesterday recounted those close calls while testifying at the trial of two men accused in the May 3 slaying of Sgt. Stephen Liczbinski, 39. Nastasiak testified that...

Lee Terrey is a lucky man for many reasons. Foremost is that he's married to a woman who loves the smell of canvas. What's more, she's willing to ride shotgun in his open World War II Army jeep. Not only doesn't she whine or complain ("It's too cold!" "My hair's getting messed up"), she actually enjoys it. "It's fun," says Ann Terrey, who lives in Chadds Ford. She agrees with Enzo Ferrari, who once called the jeep "the only true American sports car. " Her husband's jeep - a 1944 Willys MB - and other military vehicles of that era are exciting, she says, because "they take you back.

Chief John Coffey had his suspicions that the bearded fellow on a black mountain bike whom he charged Tuesday afternoon with breaking into a Jeep and stealing a car phone wasn't really only 17. The suspect - who police charged as a juvenile with burglary, theft, resisting arrest and related offenses - was taken to the county's juvenile shelter in Blackwood to await a hearing. Yesterday, however, the purported teenager was moved to the Camden County jail after authorities learned that he wasn't a juvenile after all but a 22- year-old by the name of Raphael Vargas, of the 1000 block of Westminster Avenue in Camden.

A Chester County man who stoked terrorism fears when he crashed his Jeep through a locked fence and onto runways at Philadelphia International Airport in March was sentenced Wednesday to 16 months in federal prison. Kenneth R. Mazik, 25, of Chadds Ford, blamed the March 1 incident on what he said were delusions caused by an addiction to the behavioral drug Adderall. "I was operating in a different space and time," he told U.S. District Judge Mitchell S. Goldberg. The judge acknowledged that Mazik was possibly in a drug-induced psychosis at the time.

A 21-year-old woman was killed yesterday morning when the Jeep she was driving crossed the center line of rain-slicked Haverford Road and struck an oncoming Narberth ambulance. Haverford Township police did not reveal the woman's identity yesterday pending notification of her relatives. The accident occurred at 10:20 a.m. as the Jeep, heading north, rounded a slight curve in the road near the intersection with Rugby Road. Police said the Jeep veered into the southbound lanes, where the ambulance struck its right side.

2011 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon 4x4: Jeep's answer to the Hummer H2. But did anyone ask the question? Price as Tested: $37,175 (Base price: $32,745). Conventional wisdom: Only in a Jeep. Reality: Big, a beast to drive, thirsty. But it's true there's nothing else like it. Even Jeep lovers didn't like it: Mrs. Passenger Seat has always had a thing for Jeeps. So I thought this would be the test ride of her dreams. But even she didn't like this one. A colleague at work who has a '99 didn't like it, either.

Two Norristown men were killed early yesterday morning when their Jeep veered off the Schuylkill Expressway and crashed into the back of a tractor-trailer truck parked on the shoulder. The driver of the Jeep, Kamal Stevens, 25, and a backseat passenger, Omar Jenkins, 19, were pronounced dead at the scene about 5 a.m., state police said. Two other male passengers were injured, Trooper Stanley Wells said. Curtis Lever, 22, and Byron Jones, 26, both of Norristown, were listed in critical condition late yesterday afternoon at Allegheny University Hospitals, MCP, in East Falls.

Getting around in the snow can be a pricey proposition. The Range Rover Autobiography model has a base price of $130,995. The Porsche Cayenne Turbo checks in at $108,750. Granted, these are rather extreme cases. But they do underscore the point that all-wheel-drive vehicles do dip more deeply into your pocket than their two-wheel-drive counterparts. In exchange for the peace of mind they give you on a snowy ride home, AWD systems typically add a couple of thousand dollars to your vehicle's price tag and subtract several MPGs from its fuel economy.

VATICAN CITY - After a week marked by acts of simplicity and openness, Pope Francis finally let his words do the talking as he officially began his stewardship of the Catholic Church on Tuesday. "Please," he implored the tens of thousands, both poor and powerful, gathered outside St. Peter's Basilica. "Let us be protectors of creation, protectors of God's plan inscribed in nature, protectors of one another and of the environment. " It was a message Pope Francis has hinted at, but now he made it clear, as he urged the economic, political and religious leaders arrayed before him not to allow "omens of destruction and death to accompany the advance of this world.

The 2014 Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT that will debut in showrooms in mid-April is a full-size SUV that weighs 21/2 tons and is capable of towing 31/2 tons. The idea that such a big beast of burden could acquire Corvette-like qualities might strike you as fodder for an automotive tale from the Brothers Grimm. You know, off-road frog turns into the prince of speed. But, in fact, the fun-loving mad scientists at Jeep have wrought something as Viperish as it is SUVish. "It feels and drives like a sports car, but it happens to be an SUV," says a smiling Dave Cottrell, the SRT's chief engineer.

A Chester County man who stoked terrorism fears when he crashed his Jeep through a locked fence and onto runways at Philadelphia International Airport in March was sentenced Wednesday to 16 months in federal prison. Kenneth R. Mazik, 25, of Chadds Ford, blamed the March 1 incident on what he said were delusions caused by an addiction to the behavioral drug Adderall. "I was operating in a different space and time," he told U.S. District Judge Mitchell S. Goldberg. The judge acknowledged that Mazik was possibly in a drug-induced psychosis at the time.

A 21-year-old woman was seriously injured Friday afternoon when a horse-drawn carriage she was operating hit a car in Old City, police and fire officials said. The accident happened about 3:45 p.m. at Third and Callowhill Streets, said Officer Tanya Little, a police spokeswoman. The carriage was stopped at a traffic light on Third when the horse was startled and ran into oncoming traffic on Callowhill, Little said. The horse hit a Jeep, and the woman was flung onto the car's windshield.

Federal prosecutors charged a Chadds Ford man today with disrupting services and endangering safety at Philadelphia International Airport on March 1 when he allegedly crashed his Jeep through a gate and raced 100 mph down a runway. Kenneth Richard Mazik, 24, was arrested by federal authorities on March 12 and has been free on $250,000 bail since April. He was charged by criminal information, a process which generally indicates a plea deal is in the works. An FBI arrest affidavit said Mazik crashed his black Jeep Grand Cherokee through a locked gate on the southeast perimeter of the airport as an aircraft was approaching for a landing.

Police are investigating a fatal crash in North Philadelphia where a 50-year-old woman was killed when a jeep she was a passenger in flipped onto a makeshift porch. Around 1:30 a.m., Sheila Whalen, of the 1000 block of North Pallas St., was killed when a 2002 Jeep Liberty she was traveling in struck two yellow parking poles on the 3100 block of North Bambrey St. The Jeep then flipped and went airborne, and landed on the porch of a residence. Rescue workers extricated Whalen from the vehicle and she was pronounced dead at the scene.

BUTLER, Pa. - The jeep - that sculpture in steel and sheet metal that the Museum of Modern Art once hailed as "the perfect gadget" - is still drawing raves in the town where its legend began. The good citizens of Butler, about 30 miles north of Pittsburgh, are aglow from this month's inaugural Bantam Jeep Heritage Festival. "It was amazing," said Jack Cohen, executive director of the Butler County Tourism and Convention Bureau, organizer of the three-day bash, which attracted jeeps from 28 states and four foreign countries.

BUTLER, Pa. - Thirty miles north of Pittsburgh, where industrial giants such as U.S. Steel were just beginning to forge the metallic backbone of the nation's World War II machine, a tiny company that made even tinier cars developed the prototype for a vehicle that would revolutionize the way soldiers traveled: the Jeep. The inaugural Bantam Jeep Heritage Festival, which runs through Sunday, celebrates the four-wheeled warrior with a parade of more than 1,200 of them; a "playground" where aficionados can drive over rocky obstacles, hills, and bridges; and fairlike entertainment and eats.

2011 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon 4x4: Jeep's answer to the Hummer H2. But did anyone ask the question? Price as Tested: $37,175 (Base price: $32,745). Conventional wisdom: Only in a Jeep. Reality: Big, a beast to drive, thirsty. But it's true there's nothing else like it. Even Jeep lovers didn't like it: Mrs. Passenger Seat has always had a thing for Jeeps. So I thought this would be the test ride of her dreams. But even she didn't like this one. A colleague at work who has a '99 didn't like it, either.