Two women indicted on separate felonies

The officer suffered bruises and returned to work.

STAFF report

WARREN — Tracye L. Peno, the woman who led police on a low-speed chase on East Market Street last month that resulted in injuries to a Warren police officer, has been indicted on a charge of failure to comply with the order or signal of a police officer.

Peno, 36, of South Street Southeast, Warren, could be sentenced to up to five years in prison if she is convicted on the felony charge.

She will be arraigned on the charge at 1:30 p.m. Sept. 5 in Judge W. Wyatt McKay’s courtroom in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court.

A police officer was called to East Market Street at around 4 p.m. July 9 for a car weaving erratically at low speed. The officer caught up to Peno’s car and tried unsuccessfully for several minutes to get her to pull over.

Another officer, Sgt. Joe O’Grady, pulled his cruiser in front of Peno’s car near Country Club Drive and walked toward the driver’s door of Peno’s car.

He opened the door to Peno’s car and tried to put his foot on the brake. But Peno sped up, leaving O’Grady hanging from the driver’s side door of her car. The car then collided with the left side of O’Grady’s cruiser, pinning O’Grady between the two vehicles.

O’Grady suffered bruises and returned to work within a couple days.

The grand jury declined to indict Peno on a charge of aggravated vehicular assault, which carries the same penalty as failure to comply.

In another indictment, a woman has also been charged with 10 counts of grand theft and one count of tampering with records on allegations of committing $11,010 worth of food stamp fraud against the Trumbull County Department of Job and Family Services.

Tracy Lynn Rupert, 40, of North River Road, Warren, faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted on the felony charges. The offenses were alleged to have occurred between February 2003 and October 2007.