Law&Crime Sidebar - Caught on Camera: Model Allegedly on ‘Pink Cocaine’ Triggers Deadly Crash

Episode Date: May 27, 2025

Aspiring model and Instagram influencer Maecee Lathers faces multiple felony charges after Miami police discovered she had the gas pedal of her Mercedes pressed all the way to the floor when she allegedly ran a red light. Lathers, who told EMTs she had ingested "tusi," also called "pink cocaine," caused a chain reaction crash that claimed the lives of two men. Law&Crime’s Jesse Weber sat down with Florida criminal defense attorney and former prosecutor Melba Pearson to discuss newly released traffic camera footage of the collision.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: If you’re ever injured in an accident, you can check out Morgan & Morgan. You can submit a claim in 8 clicks or less without having to leave your couch. To start your claim, visit: https://forthepeople.com/LCSidebarHOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea & Jay CruzScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondery app Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand. views shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller that

will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. We got our hands on video from a Miami traffic camera, which showed the moment in intersection went from relatively calm to complete chaos. Florida prosecutors say it just took fractions of a second for Instagram model Macy Lathers to ruin multiple lives, including her own. And it's her actions before she got behind the wheel of the car and after the deadly crash that have her in a lot of trouble. Welcome to Sidebar. Presented by Law and Crime, I'm Jesse Weber. In the early morning hours of Saturday, August 10th, 2024 around sunrise, traffic in Miami was light.

Some drivers were on their way to work, and that included Abraham Molina and Hesuz Rubio. Men were carpooling along with Molina's partner when they entered the intersection at northeast 8th Street and North Miami Avenue. Now, 8th has traffic traveling both ways, but North Miami is a one-way street. Now, as the Silver Suzuki drove into the intersection, a black range rover traveling the other direction crossed paths with it right where the roads met. And at that exact moment, police say, 24-year-old Macy Lathers with her foot mashed all the way down on the accelerator, blasted through the red light on North Miami Avenue, and collided with the other cars. Toxicology reports would later show she had several different drugs in her system, including Tusi. This is sometimes referred to as pink cocaine. Now, the aftermath was brutal.

Molina, Rubio, they were both killed. Molina's partner and the driver of the range rover, they were rushed to hospitals, they were expected to recover. But you have this nearby traffic camera that caught the crash apparently. And it also apparently caught lathers, appearing to allegedly sneak away from the scene. Now, we're going to get more into her wild arrest, where her case stands now. But first, we've got to talk about this latest new video evidence, crucial new video evidence.

And for that, I want to bring in criminal defense attorney. and former prosecutor, Melba Pearson, Melba, thank you so much for coming here on Sidebar. You know, I think sometimes we forget that we're driving around in, what, 5,000 pound machines that on the one hand, they're equipped to protect us as best as they can, but on the other, they can cause catastrophic damage to other vehicles in human lives in a second, in a second. This is one of those cases that I think unfortunately reminds you of that. yes absolutely and hello jesse always great to be on with you and this is one of those tragic situations

where a lot of times we take driving for granted we just kind of hop behind a wheel we go and we just don't always think as carefully about safety and all these other aspects and unfortunately i think you know folks can point to times where maybe they had one or two drinks probably shouldn't have driven that sort of thing but what we're looking at here is way beyond that you know we're looking at a situation where somebody was so inebriated. I mean, by the time, and I know we're going to get into that later on, but by the time she was arrested, she's vomiting. I mean, she's, you know, Topla, she's completely out of her mind. And that's somebody who should have called an Uber, plain and simple. Like, there's no excuse for that. And even though we have the ability of ride

sharing apps or other forms of transportation, you probably see day in and day out more instances of alleged drunk driving or driving while on intoxicated, driving while on a substance. It happens, what, every day? And I just, it's hard to fathom that this can still happen. Absolutely. And again, you know, we all can get the concept of you, the night didn't go as you planned, right? You thought you were just going to have one drink and whatever the case may be. But it's just another reminder about being responsible and knowing that, okay, if I enjoyed the evening a little bit too much. Leave my car wherever it is. I can go back and get it in the morning because it's not worth the pain and suffering of number one killing people, right? Like

literally two people who should still be here today are gone as a result of one irresponsible action. And secondly, even if you don't harm someone, you think about the fact that if you're pulled over for a DUI, the amount of money it takes to defend that case, the amount of fines that you're facing. A DUI can cost you anywhere upwards of $50,000. So is it worth it for one night to just be that irresponsible or is it just a better course of action to leave the car where it's at, take a ride share, call a friend, whatever the case may be, to save yourself and to save the people around you? So these are allegations against her, but my goodness, look at the evidence. So that's what we want to talk about. We want to talk about what police were able to see when they checked

out these traffic cameras near the corner of 8th in Miami. So it's around 6.49 a.m. just again, think about how early this is. 6.49 a.m. You have a dark SUV pulls up to a red light on Miami Avenue and stops. The Silver Suzuki and the Black Range Rover, they both enter the intersection at the same time, again, from opposite directions. And then in some sort of twisted, I don't even want to say perfect, but it's the timing of this that matters. They're Mercedes that's driven by Macy Lathers, apparently smashes into both cars. Now, we're not going to show you the moment of the impact, but the momentum sends all three cars spinning.

Melba, according to an arrest warrant for Lathers, she didn't even try to slow down. I want to take a listen to this. So it reads, on Friday, August 16th, 2024, search warrant was executed on vehicle number one. The vehicle's electronic data recorder was collected. A download of the EDR reveal that vehicle number one was traveling at approximately 57 miles per hour, five seconds before the crash with the accelerator at

100%. Vehicle 1 speed increased to 78 miles per hour at the moment of impact with vehicle number two at the intersection of North Miami Avenue and North 8th Street. This area has a posted speed limit of 30 miles per hour. Now Melba, how accurate is that data? Well, actually, as you were reading that, Jesse, I was thinking because, again, I live in Miami. And I was like, yeah, that you have no business even going anywhere over 50 because that's, again, it's a very congested area. It's kind of a downtown area where people are transitioning to go to work and a lot of residents and high rises in the area. So, I mean, even 40, 45 is pushing it. And for her to be going at that rate of speed, it's just insanity, especially since this is someplace where she's

familiar, you know the speed limit, you know, it's perilous. And again, I think it just speaks to the fact that she was just so inebriated that she had no concept of anything. But that data is airtight. I mean, can the defense attorney say, well, how do we know exactly how fast the car was going? How do we know exactly her foot was on the pedal that much? I mean, is that something a defense attorney can argue against or is this, no, once you look at that car data, it's pretty airtight? Well, one thing I always like to say is that everyone is entitled to a defense. Doesn't mean it's going to be a good defense. Doesn't mean it's going to be a winning defense, but you're entitled to a defense.

So a defense attorney, of course, can get up and try to attack the veracity of that data. Will it be successful? Highly unlikely because, again, you still can't get away from the footage of her slamming through those two cars and then in the aftermath, not even staying to render aid or attempting to leave without rendering aid. And that is not going to play very well in front of a jury. So this is a situation where she needs to take a plea and, you know, take her prison time and go about her business. Just a really, really sad, unfortunate case that shouldn't have happened. And it's one that we have been following from the very beginning.

And the reason that we're able to do that is because we get incredible support from our amazing sponsor, Morgan and Morgan. So this is America's largest injury law firm. And honestly, they have an amazing track record. In the past few months, Morgan and Morgan secured a $9.3 million verdict for a car crash victim in Florida, a $5.6 million verdict for another car accident victim in Atlanta, and not to mention, $1.8 million in Kentucky, after insurance offered them, just $5,000 in that case. And even if you think your case isn't worth millions of dollars, why not just start a claim and fight for what you deserve? Morgan and Morgan makes it so simple.

You can start a claim from your phone in just eight clicks and everything, from signing contracts, to uploading documents, to talk to your team. it can all be done through the phone. So if you're injured, you can easily start a claim at for the people.com slash LC sidebar. I don't think there's an alternative explanation for I had to speed up at that exact moment because of XYZ. Absolutely not.

Yeah, there's no other explanation for what she did. And then, of course, her admissions kind of make everything very clear as well. So, yeah, I don't see that there's a lot here for defense counsel to work with. So at least one of the cars that the Mercedes hit had started to smoke and bystanders, other drivers, they started to pull over to see how they could help. Now, look very closely at the top of the screen.

It's only been what, about 30 seconds since the impact, and the Mercedes has spun around. It's a little bit back from the two cars that it hit. And you can see someone, get out of the Mercedes, walk around the front of the car, avoiding contact with an apparent good Samaritan who stopped to help, police say that is Macy Lathers, wearing a red jacket with a hood. She has the hood pulled up around her face. She crosses 8th Street in the crosswalk and then paces back and forth at the corner for several seconds. Then she appears to continue walking down Miami Avenue in the direction of the camera

where their face apparently still obscured by the red hood. Another camera facing away from the accident shows Lathers walking into frame and at one point seemingly appearing to kneel or squat down on the ground, at some point police alleged that Lathers tried to blend in with a group of runners who went by headed back in the direction of the crash. So Melba, you know, Lathers would later be charged with leaving the scene of a deadly accident on top of manslaughter charges. Does it seem to you that she is making a conscious effort to avoid?

getting caught or is she just confused and disoriented not know what's going on what do you think well jesse if you're confused and disoriented after a crash you usually stay on the scene you're either still sitting behind the wheel like oh my gosh what just happened maybe you get out of the car but you're going to you know maybe drop down right next to the core if you're in a situation where you're kind of like you have something of some wits about you you're going to go try and check on the other people, right, and try to figure out, hey, is everyone okay? Can I call 911? What, you know, oh my gosh, I didn't, I can't believe this happened versus putting your hood up because I doubt she was driving with her hood up. So you're putting your hood up another tactic

to try and obscure yourself. You're walking away from the scene. You're deliberately walking around the car and trying to kind of blend in. And then you're walking away. And maybe if she had kept walking it would have worked better for her but instead she turned around and came back that again may have been just a bad choice or the drugs or whatever the case may be but then she comes back to the scene i it is just clear to me that she is trying to evade responsibility and at the very least just have the human decency to check on the people that got hit it's just it's just and that that's interesting right so on one hand we're going to play this in a minute but the idea of what was in her system was she in her right mind was she not but yet having the sense to avoid detection and

walk with the crowd and put the hood up maybe thinking about cameras maybe thinking about other people that that's that's interesting yeah it's very like oh you don't see me no one sees me no we all but but you have your wits about you to know that even if you are on some sort of substance you have your wits about you that you know something might not you might want to try to avoid detection i mean if the allegations are true Yeah, exactly. She's like, yeah, I get out of the situation. That is almost like a self-preservation mindset that she got into.

And she was like, I got to get out of the situation. I know this is really bad. I don't know how bad. I'm getting out of here. And luckily, people were able to stop her. And of course, we have the video evidence, you know, with regards to that. But yeah, it's very clear she's trying to evade detection. Yeah, because within 10 minutes of the crash happening, an ambulance arrives at the scene.

and a Miami police officer is seen using police tape to block off the very same section of the sidewalk where lathers had been minutes before. So according to police, witnesses realized that lathers had been involved in the crash and they kept her near the scene. Body cam footage from Miami PD shows an officer finding one of his colleagues guarding lathers, who at this point, by the way, is laying on the ground, hands cuffed behind her back. She appears to moan, seems to roll around in pain, definitely unsure of what exactly is going on here. But in the body cam, the officers are trying to figure out if Lather has any injuries. And that is when she reveals she took a drug known as Tusi or Pink Cocaine. So according to an NYU Medical School report published in 2023, it's usually a combination of a lot of different drugs, ketamine, ecstasy, cocaine, meth, opioids, other psychoactives. the researchers say it's pink color is really just for aesthetics it's just for looks take a look

What do you want to have you? What do you bring you? Hmm? I don't know what happened? You see what happened? Yeah, okay? Yeah, okay. Forty-five.

I need rescue who to check on one of the passengers in the vehicle. Two, seven. Yeah. Miami and 8 Miami 8 on the south east out one corner black shirt Just stay like that Relax stay on your left because you're doing up Stay like that

Look that way Ma'am can you stay over looking that way? Put that left straight here No, that's good, she'll be sideways, but oh hey, ma'am Relax, relax She's good. She's good, man, She'll go ahead and off the bridge.

I think you were involved in a crash. She probably won't be able to walk. Does anything hurt you? Who heard you? Who heard the thing? Who had heard the thing? Yeah, they'll be here. We have real time one of the car.

Any for those cars? Can you guys? What about, right? Ma'am, ma'am. Ma'am, what car are you driving? Ma'am, what car are you driving? My name is Mercedes. Is it?

My name is Moussades. Come down, come down, come down. Come down. Come down. I'm from the future. Awesome. Are you on drugs? What do you want?

Oh, wow. 4,514. They get her up. I mean, though, if you know that we have this thing, we can advise fire rescue. She just told us now, she's on Tuesday. She's a joke. She's on me one of the vehicles they got into a collision. She's claiming, she's on Fusi.

Yeah, no, it's related. They had her detain. She's with the white Mercedes, they're going to turn after. Do you have the neck page? How happened? She had the leg of her? Yeah. She tried to leave the scene.

Do you look your right over? No, she's come. Oh, she's coming. All right, all right. All right. You try to make sure she's not like I'm on my work. Okay. Ma'am, ma'am.

Relax. Remember I told you to relax? Get up. Yep. Okay. Get her up. Get her up. She's crazy now.

She's going to do a quick assessment to go back and she broke up there. She, about it what she does. She, I guess she's on Tussie. So she's serving home. She's like, oh I'm from the future. Okay, let me.

We'll get her there. We'll get her there. Yeah. Name me yours, because supposedly, they're trying to leave the scene. Alright, then I'm just gonna need an officer come with this.

Yeah, yeah, gotcha, got you. Aliens. They're coming. They're going. They're going, they're going. Yeah. Go, go, go, go, go. Go, go, go.

Go, go, go, go. When she's in the ambulance, Lathers is still mostly incoherent. What's going on? Yeah, Pavia, oh, it's fine. What's going on? Mason, do you know where you are? No. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I'm in her. Where? Earth. You're where? Earth. The roof? Earth. Yeah, we were all on Earth.

Do you know where you are? What city? Oh, Miami. Miami. Do you know what happened? Do you remember what? What happened? Yeah, I don't.

Go to the car. Go to the car. Go, go to the car. You're taking in your drugs? Yeah. Pink. Pink, pink, pink, tucy, pink, tucy, pink, tucy, pink, two see, pink, tucy, go, go, go now.

Go, go, go, now, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, pink, pink, pink, think, I think, think, think, I'm gonna sit down, but I'm going to be dizzy. Yeah. Others originally faced eight counts when she first appeared in Miami's bond court, where it was revealed that not only did she not have a driver's license, but she'd been banned from having one. So Melba, does this further support the theory about a total disregard for the safety of others? Absolutely. And it also explains as another layer of explanation as to why she was fleeing the scene because she knew she had no business driving. And so and there's no, you know, extenuating circumstance. She had to rush to the hospital.

She's trying to help someone. There's no justification as to why she was behind the wheel that day. And there's no justification for her being behind the wheel in that inebriated state. And there's no way to police that. What do I mean? You might ban someone's license, but you can't physically prevent them from getting in the car. I know there's possible legislation or maybe they have this in some states about there's putting locks on cars, right, that you can't drive it if you don't have a license

or your license is suspended. But there's no way to actually police somebody from getting behind the wheel of a car. There really isn't. I mean, you think about young people who may go joyriding and, you know, don't have a license. There's no way to prevent that, you know. And then, of course, people who may have their license suspended because they can't afford to pay tickets or whatever the case may be, but they still have to go to work. And it's not the kind of kind of like here in Florida, we don't really have much of a public transit system. So if you want to get to work in a timely manner, you're going to drive, and then you have the situation of you're driving without a license.

But again, this is a whole other level in terms of you went to an event or a party, got that messed up. And then on top of that, I mean, I guess, though, the joke is if you're going to commit a crime when you try to commit one, don't try to commit one at the same time. So you already know you have no business driving. You're going to drive and be inebriated. And then on top of that, kill people. Yeah, after prosecutors got the results of Lathers toxicology tests, they added the manslaughter charges, the D.Y manslaughter charges.

And officials say Lathers tested positive for MDMA, you know, ecstasy, ketamine. She's now facing 10 charges, all of them felonies, and has entered a not guilty plea. Miami-Dade County record show she's still locked up, still awaits trial. Would it be tough to prove manslaughter? Not at all. Not at all. I mean, because, again, manslaughter is a charge that there's no kind of requisite in, like, premeditation, you know, this is not an intentional thing. Manslaughter is basically a charge that was designed for an accidental death, meaning you did not intend for death the result, but your actions caused it and your actions were basically negligent. And her actions were very much so.

You know, I think it's very much a slam dunk for the prosecution, which is why I think a plea is probably going to be in the best interest of the defendant. defendant. Let me ask you this. I mean, you mentioned before the possibility of a plea deal that seems to be what might be in her best interest. Do you know what she's currently facing and what would a plea deal potentially look like for her when she, I mean, the allegations are she killed two people? And while DOI manslaughter in Florida carries a maximum of 15 years, now granted, there's going to be two counts of that because two people tragically lost their lives. And the court has the option of running it consecutively. So in terms of her maximum sentence, you know, she may be looking at, you know, maybe 30 years or so, again, depending on how the court wants to,

if they want to run everything consecutively or if they want to run the sentences concurrent. So she could be facing anything from as a max 15 to 13. Depending on her criminal history, she may have a floor of, you know, again, maybe two, three years, something along those lines. To me, a plea would look like definite prison time, maybe something along the lines of seven to 10 years followed by probation, likely in that probationary time, she would have to go to a substance abuse, do some substance abuse treatment. And if there's restitution or anything, she can pay back to the families, which, I mean, listen, there's no amount of money that will ever bring someone back. But in terms of, you know, if there's other damages that she can reimburse the families, then maybe that might

be included. But I think the focus is going to be prison time as well as a substance abuse treatment. Just a tragedy. A tragedy should not have happened. Really, really sad case. Melville Pearson, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you, Jesse. Always great to be on with you. And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us. And as always, please subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcast, Spotify, wherever you should get your podcasts. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. You can binge all episodes of this long crime series ad free right now on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.