MONROE UNFILTERED: THE DAILY BUZZ | Oct. 1
Morales Takes the Stand and a Housing Hangover
Thursday, October 1, 2026
DAILY WEATHER
October opens on the warm side. Today is cloudy with a high near 77°F, a 24% chance of a passing shower, and a low around 62°F tonight.
Friday is the warmest day of the stretch, in the low 80s, with a chance of an afternoon shower, so keep the umbrella in the car. Then fall finally shows up: Saturday is sunny and around 70°F, and Sunday slips to the mid 60s with a 41% chance of afternoon showers.
MORALES TAKES THE STAND, CO-DEFENDANT FLIPS
The man accused of killing Henry Koroma Jr. at a Middle Smithfield Township bar told the jury his side of the story this week. The next day, the man who had been on trial beside him testified for the prosecution.
Matthew Morales, 33, of Tobyhanna Township, is charged with criminal homicide and two felony firearms counts in the May 24, 2024, shooting death of Koroma at My Place Bar & Grill on Milford Road. His attorney, Alex Ward, says he acted in self-defense.
His Side. Testifying Monday (Sept. 28), the fifth day of the trial, Morales told jurors he joined a street gang called the Bloods at 16 or 17 and pulled away from it after a hard stretch in federal prison, the Pocono Record reports. He said he and Koroma had been friends since they were young, until about two weeks before the shooting, and that some of his texts were his way of telling Koroma he wanted out of the gang.
That night, he said, six or seven people crowded into the bar's outdoor smoking area, known as the "chicken coop," and he believed he had been set up. He testified that Koroma threw a punch and told him he was surrounded, and that he fired only once because after that Koroma was no longer a threat. Then he ran: to Allentown, ditching the gun on the way, then took an Uber to New York City to say goodbye to his son and a bus to Utah, where he worked off the books until he was shot at a nightclub there.
The DA Pushes Back. District Attorney Michael Mancuso got Morales to agree that Koroma had no weapon in his hand when he was shot, and that he never saw anyone pull one. Mancuso also showed jurors a form Morales signed waiving protective custody at the Northampton County jail, pressing him on whether he had really left the gang. Morales said he had.
The Flip. On Tuesday (Sept. 29), co-defendant Raymond Batiste, 40, of Allentown, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor obstruction charge and was sentenced to one year of probation by President Judge Jonathan Mark. He had been on trial on two felony counts of hindering apprehension. The same day, he took the stand as a rebuttal witness for the prosecution.
Batiste testified that he did not hear anyone other than Koroma threaten Morales, that Koroma told Morales he was not going to shoot him, and that after the shooting Morales told him his life was over. Batiste said he told Morales to turn himself in. Morales's attorney, Alex Ward, countered that Batiste took a deal to get probation. Asked what prosecutors wanted in return, Batiste said: the truth. Batiste's own attorney, Chief Public Defender Jason LaBar, told the Record that Morales's own testimony influenced the decision to plead.
No verdict had been reported as of Wednesday evening. Morales is presumed innocent until proven guilty. We will have the verdict when it lands.
THE DAILY RUNDOWN
ESU Officer Due in Court. Joseph P. Gallagher Jr., 40, of East Stroudsburg, the East Stroudsburg University police officer charged with 22 counts including rape of a child, is scheduled for his preliminary hearing today. He is being held without bail at the Monroe County Correctional Facility and is presumed innocent until proven guilty. We will report what happens in tomorrow's Buzz.
MONROE'S HOUSING HANGOVER
Credit where it's due: the Pocono Record's Brian Myszkowski dug into a new report that ranks the Poconos among the riskiest places in Pennsylvania for home foreclosures. It's his story, and it's worth your time. Here's the short version.
The 2026 Pennsylvania Foreclosure Risk Index ranks Philadelphia first, followed by Pike, Wayne, Monroe and Carbon counties. Monroe scores 66.8, in the "elevated" range. The report calls the region "a boom market with a hangover." Its author, NestCash founder John Carter, says buyers poured in between 2020 and 2022, many stretching to the top of their budgets, and the market is now working through the consequences.
In Monroe, 21.2% of homes for sale have had a price cut, against a statewide median of 17.4%. Homes sit 60 days on the market here, versus 52 statewide. And Monroe's 1.5% mortgage delinquency rate is the highest of the four Pocono counties and well above the 1% statewide figure, which the report calls the signal that separates a slow market from a distressed one.
One thing to keep in mind, which the Record flags too: the index comes from NestCash, a company that buys homes directly from owners for cash.
For the full picture, including how the index is built and how Pike and Wayne compare, read Myszkowski's story at poconorecord.com.
STATE OF THE KEYSTONE STATE
Independents Knock on the Primary Door. The state House voted 115-88 on Tuesday (Sept. 29) to let voters who aren't registered with a major party vote in Pennsylvania's primaries. Under House Bill 280, sponsored by Rep. Jared Solomon (D-Philadelphia), an unaffiliated voter could choose one party's primary ballot but could not vote in party committee races.
Our House delegation split along party lines. Rep. Tarah Probst (D-189), a co-sponsor, and Rep. Maureen Madden (D-115) voted yes. Rep. Jack Rader (R-176) voted no. Sixteen Republicans statewide voted yes, according to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star.
The bill now heads to the Republican-controlled Senate, where Majority Leader Joe Pittman says voting changes should come paired with expanded voter ID. Votebeat reports the bill faces long odds there. Meanwhile, more than 13% of Pennsylvania voters are now unaffiliated, and for now they still sit out every primary.
Worth being precise: this is not a true open primary. Independents would still have to pick one party's ballot, and party committee races would stay members-only. But it is a step toward giving centrist candidates a fighting chance. Today, primaries are decided by each party's most loyal members. Let in voters who belong to neither party, many of them moderates, and candidates can't win on the base alone.
Measles Claims a Fifth Life. The state Department of Health confirmed Wednesday that an unvaccinated Lancaster County resident has died, the fifth measles-associated death in Pennsylvania's outbreak. There are now 943 cases in 39 counties and 176 hospitalizations, and only four of those cases involved vaccinated people. The good news for us: Monroe County is not among the 39 counties on the department's case map as of Wednesday's update.
That's fitting for the county that helped build America's vaccine supply. As we wrote two weeks ago (Sept. 16), Col. Richard Slee's Pocono Biological Laboratories started turning out smallpox vaccine in Swiftwater in 1897, and that same campus, now run by Sanofi, is one of the country's leading flu vaccine producers. Let's keep our own MMR shots current and keep Monroe off that map.
WHAT WERE YA THINKIN'?
Caught Red Shirtless. Pocono Township police say a man tried to commit fraud at the First National Bank on Route 611 in Tannersville on Sept. 23, then slipped out a side door. Bank staff told officers to look for a man in a red polo. Officers found a man matching the description who, police say, took his shirt off to change his appearance and then ran. David J. Yorwerth, 60, of New Haven, Conn., now faces identity theft, forgery, attempted theft by deception, evading arrest on foot and access device fraud charges, with bail set at $50,000. Turns out a shirtless man running from police draws more attention than a red polo. He is presumed innocent until proven guilty.