From: QuiGon7x@webtv.net




Subject: Officers Investigating Accident Sprayed Her With Mace & TookCamera!




Date: Tue 09/27/05 08:12 AM





Horrendous!

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/25/nyregion/25hit.html

Officer's Car Strikes Girl From Bronx, Killing Her

By KAREEM FAHIM
Published: September 25, 2005

A 12-year-old Bronx girl was struck and killed Friday night by a car
driven by an off-duty police officer, according to the police. The
killing was accidental, the police said, adding that the girl, Virginia
Verdree, darted into the street 30 feet from a crosswalk.

The accident occurred on the Grand Concourse near East 183rd Street
about 10:20 p.m. The police declined to identify the 37-year-old
officer, but a law enforcement official said that he worked in a
narcotics unit in Manhattan. The officer's wife was a passenger in the
car, a Jeep Cherokee, the official said.

Virginia, a sixth grader who lived on East 183rd Street, died later at
St. Barnabas Hospital.
Her sister, Latoya Richardson, 23, said that officers investigating the
accident sprayed her with Mace and detained her after she took pictures
of the scene. She added that they confiscated a disposable camera she
had bought to take the pictures.

Ms. Richardson was issued a summons for disorderly conduct, the police
said, because she had interfered with the accident investigation by
refusing to leave the area they had secured around the scene. Speaking
outside the 46th Precinct station house yesterday afternoon, Ms.
Richardson said that after hearing her sister had been killed, she
rushed to a nearby store, bought the camera and started taking pictures
of the license plate on the car that hit her sister and of other details
related to the accident.

She said that when officers at the scene told her to stop, she ran.

"They tackled me - all men," she said. "I weigh 130 pounds. I'm little."

The camera was returned to her late yesterday afternoon.

Before the accident on Friday night, Virginia had attended a youth
service at the Love Gospel Assembly church on the Grand Concourse,
according to her aunt, Cathy Tribble, who said Virginia was the youngest
of seven children.

Matthew Sweeney contributed reporting for this article.

More Articles in New York Region >
Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company