Felony Charges After High Speed Chase

Two women remained in custody Monday morning, April 1, charged with grand larceny. One of the women, Dominque Scaggs, allegedly led police on a high-speed chase, with her car crashing into a telephone pole and almost striking a house. The other woman, Alicia Descalzo, was a passenger.

According to Riverhead Town police, they received a call reporting the theft by the two women of more than $1000 worth of cosmetics from the CVS on Old Country Road late Saturday morning, March 30. An officer soon spotted the vehicle, a 2004 Chevrolet SUV, being driven by Scaggs, 29, of Calverton, and tried to pull her over, but Scaggs allegedly tried to evade police. Descalzo, 35, has given police different home addresses over the years.

With police in pursuit, Scaggs lost control of her vehicle, and went off road after striking a parked car. Scaggs’s vehicle then bounced off a telephone pole, and plowed through a fence, stopping just short of the exterior of a house.

Police said that Scaggs was high on drugs at the time. In the backseat were Scaggs’s two infant children: a one year old, and a four month old. Police charged her with driving while high on drugs as a first-time misdemeanor, and two counts of driving with ability impaired by drugs with children in the car, felonies under
Leandra’s Law.

Per Leandra’s Law legislation — which was named for Leandra Rosado, a child who died in a 2009 car crash involving a drunk driver — Skagg’s blood was drawn.

None of the occupants of the car were injured in the crash, according to police. The children were taken to Stony Brook University Hospital to be evaluated, and the county’s Child Protective Services was notified of the incident.

Scaggs was also charged with another felony, grand larceny, and seven misdemeanors, including endangering the welfare of a child, criminal possession of narcotics, reckless driving, unlawful fleeing of a police officer, and driving without a license.

Descalzo was charged with a single count of grand larceny.

Bail was set during their arraignments in Riverhead Town Justice Court at $10,000 for Scaggs, and $750 for Descalzo. Scaggs posted bail on Monday. Descalzo remained in custody Tuesday morning.

Descalzo has a long history of arrests, on charges such as larceny and drug possession. In 2010, Suffolk County police reported finding her passed out and high on drugs in a yard behind a church, with her three-year-old child nearby. The child was turned over at that time to CPS. The final outcome of that case is not known. She currently has an open grand larceny charge in county court stemming from an incident last December.

t.e@indyeastend.com