Breaking and entering charge dismissed against housing activist Cedric Dean
A misdemeanor charge of breaking and entering against Charlotte housing activist Cedric Dean was dismissed in court on Monday, according to court records.
Dean had been accused of trying to remove a tenant from a hotel where he ran a substance abuse recovery program in May.
“My case is one small example of a larger problem,” Dean said in a press release on social media. “Too many people in Charlotte and across North Carolina are treated as guilty until proven innocent.”
Dean ran a substance abuse recovery program at a hotel called the HELP program, which stood for Heal, Empower, Love and Protect. He took the hotel’s lease over after a housing nonprofit called Heal Charlotte exited in April. Some tenants from Heal Charlotte stayed in the hotel and Dean paid some to leave.
Dean was arrested in May after a woman said he tried to force his way into her room to try to evict her from the hotel. Dean disputed this, saying he offered the woman twice the amount of money of other tenants to move out, which she accepted. But then she refused to leave, he said.
A Charlotte-Mecklenburg police affidavit said the woman told officers she didn’t take the money and called the police after Dean forced himself inside her room.
“I never forced myself in. When I knocked on the door, she opened the door. I was standing in the doorway. I called the police — me — Cedric Dean, called the police,” Dean said in May. “I stood in the doorway, called the police and told the police that she was putting her child in harm’s way.”
Federal investigation ongoing
Dean’s own home was raided in October by federal agents who accused him of committing healthcare fraud by submitting $14.5 million in Medicaid claims for services people never received, court records said. He ran a substance abuse recovery program out of a hotel in Fayetteville that was shut down due to a lack of permits.
He received more than $8 million, according to a court filing, some of which was used to buy vehicles, jewelry and properties.
This story was originally published December 4, 2025 at 5:39 PM.
