The Long Island mom charged with driving while intoxicated in the wrong-way crash that killed her 9-year-old son early Thursday appeared to shuffle unsteadily as officers led her into a waiting patrol car later in the evening.
Kerri Bedrick, dressed in blue hospital scrubs, took small shuffling steps as two New York State Police officers flanked her on each arm from the police headquarters in Brentwood to the vehicle.
Bedrick, 32, said nothing to reporters and her eyes looked to be nearly closed as the cops pointed her in the direction of the car.
When the officers placed her into the car’s backseat she slumped over and groaned loudly before the cops sat her up. She was then seen sitting up, but leaning to the side with her eyes closed and her mouth slightly ajar when the car pulled away.
The mom from Centerport was slapped with charges including driving while impaired by drugs and aggravated DWI for the early morning crash that killed her son, Eli Henrys, and injured two other drivers.
Bedrick was allegedly driving a 2022 Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross SUV that was spotted on the wrong side of the Southern State Parkway near Exit 42 in Islip at around 2:15 a.m.
She allegedly flew by a Suffolk County sheriff’s deputy who tried to pull her over and sped up just moments before careening into another car, causing a four-car pile-up, state police said.
Her son was pulled out of the back seat by the deputy and a state trooper who administered first aid before the boy was rushed to the hospital, but he couldn’t be saved. He died in the hospital.
“This was a traumatic event for all those involved,” Suffolk County Deputy Undersheriff John Beck said during a press conference.
The deputy sheriff “will have the image of this young boy’s face forever etched in his memory,” Beck added.
The drivers of two other vehicles in the pile-up — 29-year-old Haydee Meyer and 24-year-old David Picard — were also taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The driver of the fourth car was not injured, police said.
Bedrick was standing outside her mangled SUV when the officers arrived at the crash site and was given a field sobriety test. Authorities declined to release the results.
She was charged with felony aggravated unlicensed operation, operating a motor vehicle while impaired by drugs and aggravated DWI with a child less than 16 and criminal possession of a stimulant.
She is being held overnight and will be arraigned on the charges Friday morning.
