Trooper injured by drunk driver in 2003 dies

E-mail | Print | Comments (64)Posted by Martin Finucane June 1, 2011 01:54 PM

By Martin Finucane, Globe Staff

Trooper Ellen E. Engelhardt, who was left in a permanent vegetative state after being struck by a drunk driver in 2003, has died, State Police said today.

Trooper Ellen Engelhardt

“It is with profound sadness that we mourn the loss of Trooper Ellen Engelhardt, who was not just a valued colleague but also a dear friend who dedicated her career to protecting the citizens of our state. Since suffering the tragic injuries inflicted upon her in the line of duty by a drunk driver, Trooper Engelhardt has been an inspiration to every member of this Department for the courage, grace and dignity with which she lived,” Colonel Marian J. McGovern, the superintendent of the State Police, said in a statement.

Engelhardt was injured when a car traveling at nearly 100 miles per hour slammed into her cruiser, which was parked in the breakdown lane of Route 25 in Wareham.

The drunk driver, William P. Senne, who was 18 at the time of the crash, was sentenced in 2005 to 2 1/2 years in the Plymouth County House of Correction.

State Police said Engelhardt suffered “traumatic and life-altering injuries” in the crash on July 26, 2003. Her death is considered a “line-of-duty” death, and she is the 32nd member of the force to be killed in the line of duty since the agency’s founding.

A 2.5 year sentence is an absolute disgrace. What’s done is done, though, and cannot be changed; hopefully young Mr. Senne will live with this memory for the rest of his life.

Godspeed, Trooper Engelhardt…

The religion of peace strikes again!

From BGR:

CIA task force created to look into WikiLeaks; needs a better acronym

The United States’ clandestine security group — the Central Intelligence Agency — has created a task force to, as the Washington Post reports, “assess the impact of the exposure of thousands of U.S. diplomatic cables and military files by WikiLeaks.” The article goes on to note that the WikiLeaks Task Force is better known around the Agency by its acronym: WTF. We would like to take this opportunity to snicker at the task force’s acronym choice. Oh the double-entendre, what a fickle mistress you are.

Read (Washington Post)

I swear this country is going to hell in a hand-basket…

A group of students is told to stop singing the national anthem at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. because it is considered an ‘illegal demonstration’.

Best part? They started back up again, and continued singing anyway! I guess there is still hope for the next generation after all.

New Jersey Supreme Court: Police must explain breathalyzer test in driver’s native language.

Seriously??  Ignorance of the law (or language) is NOT the problem of the officer.  Are they supposed to know every damned language in the world, or have a translator on hand?

Fox News video here.

First we’re celebrating communism by flying the Chicom colors on the Empire State Building, and now –  you’re hard-earned tax dollars are funding terrorist states…

Obama pledges 400 million to Palestine