Mount Carmel man charged after woman held in Lewisburg hotel room

A Mount Carmel man faces false imprisonment and harassment charges after police say he kept a woman from leaving a Lewisburg hotel room for hours, then was found with her at a side door of the Comfort Suites on West Branch Highway.

Buffalo Valley Regional Police said officers responded shortly after 11:30 p.m. March 8 to the hotel at 4775 West Branch Highway after staff called police about an anonymous report that Gavin Alexander Dehaven had abducted a female. Patrolman Caleb Gehman said officers arrived and saw Dehaven and the woman leaving through a side door. Police separated them and interviewed the woman, who said the confrontation had started around 4:30 p.m. and continued for hours before officers intervened.

Police said the dispute began over text messages and escalated inside the room. Dehaven, 25, allegedly made repeated threatening hand motions as if he were about to strike the woman, blocked her from leaving and only let her out briefly to smoke before taking the room keys and the woman’s vape pen. Police said Dehaven later told officers the woman was free to leave, but he also acknowledged that he understood she was afraid to try.

The criminal complaint gives the case immediate public-safety weight beyond a routine hotel disturbance. In situations like this, warning signs can be clear: one person is prevented from reaching a door, personal belongings are taken, threats or threatening gestures are used, and the other person appears reluctant to leave even when given a chance. That combination can turn a private disagreement into a fast-moving restraint case that requires an urgent law-enforcement response.

Dehaven was charged with false imprisonment and harassment. Bail was set at $2,500, and a preliminary hearing was scheduled for March 26.

The incident unfolded in a place many Union County residents know by name. The Comfort Suites Lewisburg markets itself as a stop near Interstate 80 and Route 15, close to Bucknell University and the Susquehanna Valley, which made the allegations especially troubling for a hotel that regularly serves travelers, families and university visitors. The Buffalo Valley Regional Police Department, led by Chief Dan Embeck, serves Lewisburg Borough and East Buffalo Township under a shared regional arrangement, so the response came from the same agency that covers both communities.

For Mount Carmel, a borough of 5,725 in neighboring Northumberland County, the charge ties a local man to a serious allegation in the county seat region. For East Buffalo Township, which had a population of 7,421 in the 2020 census, the case underscored how quickly coercion behind closed doors can become a public emergency once someone is believed to be trapped and unable to walk away.