H.A.D.D. - HUSBAND AGAINST DRUNK DRIVING

Friday, February 20, 1998 started out a normal day by anyone's standards. I was a Corporate Manager for McDonald's Corporation at the time and had opened my restaurant that day. I was short manager help and had to ask my personal friend, Wendy, to come from another restaurant to help us so I could leave at a reasonable hour that day. I ended up working 10 hours, leaving at 4pm. Knowing my fiance, Gina, was working 10-7 today, I decided to lay down on my bed and watch television until she came home. I eventually dozed off to sleep. I was woken up by the telephone at about 7:45pm. It was my fiance telling me that she was leaving in a few minutes and asked what she should bring me for dinner from the restaurant. Gina was also a Corporate Manager for McDonald's Corporation. Although Gina had worked about an hour past her finish time, her manager, Jim, had jokingly told her that she could not leave before him because he came in 6 hours earlier than her and it wouldn't be right for her to go home before him. She, going along with the joke, complied. They both ended up leaving (Him in front of course to keep the joke going) around 8:25pm.

I dozed back off to sleep after talking to Gina. I woke up again at about 8:50pm and saw she wasn't home yet and called her restaurant. It was only a 10 minute drive and she should have been home by now. I got a hold of Andre, the night manager that night, and he told me that Gina had left almost 30 minutes ago. He suggested that she may have stopped at the grocery store, but I told him she had dinner with her, so she should have come right home. I hung up the phone and laid on the bed thinking where she could be. Then the television caught my attention...

Before I continue - here are some pictures of Gina and I prior to the crash.

This is Gina on our first Family Freezeout winter campout in 1997. For more information on that, go to www.freezeout.com

Christmas of 1996 I proposed to Gina and she obviously accepted.

We had pictures done in 1996. Here is a great one of Gina!

This was taken when we were dating for just a couple months in the summer of 1995.


Here is a picture of us at Gina's parents house for thanksgiving of 1995.

Now, back to the story...

In 1998 the local NBC affiliate WNYT would cut-in in between commercials with excerpts of news called "The Operations Center". Kris Kopastacy (Now Kris Jansing on MS-NBC) said something to this affect: "This is Kris Kapostacy and here is the latest from the Operations Center. There has been a head-on collision on Interstate 787. Two women are listed in critical condition and are being transported to Albany Medical Center. Police are on the scene and the southbound side of the highway is closed past the Route 32, Menands exit. More information will be reported as it comes in."

My heart just dropped. I told myself that it wasn't Gina, but I figured I should check it out. Still dressed in my work shoes, pants and shirt, I threw on my coat, grabbed Gina's purse (She only carried her license to work with her), and hopped in my car and went to the scene to see what I could find out. I figured that if nothing else I would look like a concerned fiance.

As I just got on 787 going northbound, I could have sworn that I saw Gina's car pass me on the opposite side of the median. To this day, I wonder if I had gotten off the highway and turned around to go home, if it would have turned out to be her and none of this nightmare would ever have come true. They say, "The Lord works in mysterious ways" and maybe that was our way out and I missed it.

I travelled along the highway and eventually hit traffic when I got closer to the crashsite. It was a cold February night, but for some reason I had the window open. I drifted along in the slow traffic and started to be able to see the lights from the emergency vehicles. I stayed in the line and just crept along. I remember not really being worried because I thought I had just seen Gina pass me on the other side of the median 10 minutes before.

I was listening to the radio and the song "If You Could Only See" by the group Tonic came on the radio. I had never heard the song before, but I listened to the lyrics: "If you could only see the way she loves me then maybe you would understand why I feel this way about our love and what I must do. If you could only see how blue her eyes can be when she says she loves me." A tear ran down my face when I heard that verse because Gina and I were going through a tough time in our relationship because we were two very career and goal oriented people and unfortunately our relationship was a distant 2nd. No sooner did I wipe the tear away that I saw more of the carnage that happened on the other side of the highway about a half of a mile ahead. I seemed to have telescopic vision because I was somehow able to focus my vision in such a way that I zoomed in on the scene. I zoomed in on one of the cars that had it's back end facing me and it was white and shaped like Gina's...I knew it was her.

Adrenaline took over. At the time, I owned a beautiful, shiny black 1996 Chevrolet Caprice Classic. This model car was often used by police agencies during that time. I turned into the left emergency lane and sped past 20-30 other cars in traffic and 5 or 6 cars that were at the scene of the accident, like newstrucks, police cars, fire engines, paramedics, etc. I was able to pull to within 15 feet of Gina's car.

I opened my door and started for her car (obviously not remembering that the new caster on the television had said that the two women were in critical condition at Albany Medical Center Hospial) when I was hit by 3 police officers and thrown up against my car. They asked me what I'm doing and I told them I knew who was in that car. Finally, 2 of the officers walked away and the officer on the scene first asked me if I was sure. I kept saying over and over again F17-6XS, F17-6XS. It took him a second, but finally he saw what I was talking about. It was Gina's license plate. I knew it by heart. It is now more than a memorized number to me. The actual image is burned on my brain. He took down her name from me and then he had the Chief of Menands Police Department talk to me. He put his arm around me and escorted me back to my car. He said to me, "Let me tell you all I know. Two women were hurt in the crash and when they left here they were alive. Anything else I tell you is speculation on my part and I won't do that. They left here in ambulances to Albany Med and that is where you should go." They opened traffic for me to go to the hospital.

I remember very distinctly going on the off ramp for route 32 from 787 thinking to myself that I am at a crossroads now. I knew I was about to embark upon a very tough time and I didn't have to go down that road if I didn't choose. That thought wasn't out my head when another thought crept in. It was me telling myself that Gina needed me and that I would be there to help her no matter what it entailed. I was in love with her and this is what someone who loves you does. I didn't need a wedding band to make me be committed to her in sickness or in health or in good times or bad. I loved her and that was all that mattered. The decision was an easy one to make and I don't regret it to this day.

I found out from the chief of police later that week that Lucy Turnbull, the woman who hit Gina, was at an office party at a local Pub and Brewery. She was a receptionist for a law firm. She drank 10-13 pints of "Ma Barkers Ale". She even left at one point to move her car so it wouldn't get towed and was ID'd when she came back in (intoxicated). She drank more and then decided it was time to go home. Allegedly people from her office offered to buy her a cab or to drive her home, but she declined saying that she was alright to drive. NOBODY PUSHED THE ISSUE ANY FURTHER - NICE FRIENDS, HUH? She got in her car, a maroon caravan, and started for home. She got onto Interstate 787 to head to Waterford, where she lived. She got onto Interstate 787 alright...by driving up an off ramp!! Witnesses said that she was bashing side to side going up the ramp and just missing cars right and left. Once she was on the highway, she continued the wrong way for 2 miles. She was swerving right and left and hitting the guard rails. Cars were beeping at her and swerving to miss her too. She was going 70 mph in the wrong direction on a Friday night when people are heading into downtown Albany to go to bars, restaurants, the Pepsi Arena, the Palace Theatre and, like my fiance, coming home from work. Eventually, Lucy passed an Albany Police car with an officer who was running radar under the I-90 overpass. He was on her side of the road and decided it would be best not to chase her going the wrong way. He went on her side of the road the other way and found a U turn opportunity to get onto the Northbound side and took it. He sped in her direction and chased her but didn't get there quick enough. My then fiance, now wife, Gina was going in the fast lane, 60 mph. Lucy was coming towards her and hit her head on going 70 mph. We suspect that a car in front of Gina got out of the way in a nick of time so they wouldn't hit, but unfortunately, that didn't allow Gina any reaction time. There were no skid marks from either car. Thank God it wasn't a perfect head-on collision. The cars were not perfectly lined up. The two passenger sides were lined up. If either car was two feet in the other direction, both of them would be dead. Gina's dashboard got knocked into her back seat wrapped around the driver seat. Lucy had child seats in her car, so the rescue crews, assuming there were children in the car, cut the roof off of her minivan before even checking on her. They thought there might be babies wedged under seats, etc. Gina's steering column had to be cut out before they could even get to her. Even though Gina had her seatbelt on, her dashboard came in to meet her face along with the steering wheel. Gina's car stopped immediately and was pushed backwards and turned around facing the direction she was coming from. Lucy's van careened off of the road into a guard rail where she was expelled through the windshield...

Before I continue some more, here are some pictures of the vehicles Gina and Lucy were driving. Gina's is the white Ford Taurus and Lucy's is the maroon Dodge Caravan. The cars are positioned face to face for police reconstruction purposes.

Below is Gina's dashboard they had to cut out the steering wheel to get her out of the car. Notice the blood on the speedometer. The top right corner of the box where the dial is located you can see where Gina hit her eye socket and right side and front of her head when the dashboard came in and met her. She was wearing a seatbelt. At one point Lucy's attorney had tried to say that Gina did not have her headlights on and that is why she was hit. If you look in this picture, you can clearly see that on the top left the headlight switch is in the on position.

Lucy's injuries were that she broke her arm and legs and had her face mangled from the glass. Her arms and legs healed and her face was just scarred.

Gina's suffered a right orbital fracture (crushed eye socket and damage to floor of eye socket)resulting in a plastic plate and titanium screw being inserted to rebuild the fractured area. There was a 5% chance of blindness, which she thankfully never suffered. Gina also suffered severe head trauma resulting in a Traumatic Brain Injury which is irreversable brain damage of cognitive and motor skills. Her reasoning, reading comprehension, information sorting, information processing, and social skills were reduced. Gina had her lip tear up from face on the right side of mouth from contact with the dash resulting in a scar that will never go away. She bit off a 1/2inch tip of tongue which was sewn back on, but now she has issues with tasting. The whiplash of the crash strained neck muscles and caused a vertabra to slip in her neck and put pressure on the spinal cord. It was reset, but Gina had to wear an upper torso brace for 4 months and now has arthritis in the neck for the rest of her life because of the crash. She broke her left collarbone from the seatbelt cross strap and her right side pelvis fractured into 3 parts. This was caused by the dashboard pushing her knee and jolting her thigh bone right through the back of the ball-in-socket joint of pelvis. This crushing of her leg and hip bones also resulting in 3 metal plates being screwed into the hip to put it back together. Her sciatic nerve was damaged because the razor sharp broken bones cut into her nerve and this ended up causing her Gina to have a dropped right foot which she will have forever. She cannot life her right foot or move her toes. She has very limited mobility of that leg and suffered nerve pain that would render her unconscious at times. She would cry herself to sleep every night because the pain was so bad. Severe arthritis is already set in and Gina had a hip replacement surgery done in 2003. She will need one every 25 years thereafter. There are also series of scars all along legs from dashboard and under steering assembly breaking and jabbing into her legs.

Here are two views of Gina. She is intubated and hooked to a ventilator and respirator. The machines are breathing for her. She has tubes in her that suck the fluid out of her lungs and stomach.

Here is Gina recovering after her hip surgery. She had to get 3 metal plates screwed into her hip to put it back together. There are the 62 staples they had to insert to hold the incision closed. There was a drainage duct installed to drain out fluid so it wouldn't cause infection. This scar extends from the side of the right leg up over the hip and across the right buttock in a long "S" shape. She has since had that hip replaced. She now has two rows of scars; one above the other.

Here is Gina after her eye surgery to put in the plastic plate and titanium screw to rebuild her eye socket. Also, you will see that this is the first time Gina is getting out of bed. She was on her back and sedated for 4 days and just unable to walk at all for a week and a half. Then this is the first time she was able to just get out of bed, with no weight on the bad leg and sit into a chair right next to the bed. Gina had to wear that same neckbrace for 4 months because of a slipped vertabra in her upper neck.

Lucy had the nerve at her sentencing to have her statement be to Gina. She said, "I just want to let Gina know that I got hurt too and that she isn't the only one who suffered from this ordeal." The judge, Judge Breslin, when he passed down her sentence did something he had never done before. (As explained to me by Marjorie Huth from Stop DWI) The Judge stood up and leaned over the bench. He looked at Lucy and yelled at her, "Who do you think you are?" He went on to barrade her for her actions. He even turned to me half way through it and told me that, yes, he does read the victim impact statements that family sends him because I made a note in mine that said, "I know you get tons of these a year and probably don't read every one of them". He thanked me for writing it. Lucy got sent to Albion Womens Prison for 3 1/2 to 7 years. She ended up serving 4 years. While Lucy was in prison, she made a point of mailing letters to Gina. She would send her poems she wrote about her children, she would tell her about how she is missing her childrens dance recitals, high school graduations and every holiday. I did not let Gina read these letters and told the courts to tell her to stop harrassing Gina. She tried to make Gina feel guilty for having her put away. Lucy has not accepted one ounce of responsibility in this matter and for some reason she blames Gina for being in her way on the highway.

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