A rookie NYPD cop who was preparing to marry her high school sweetheart died in a fiery car crash last night despite the heroic efforts of two other officers at the scene.
Hours before her tragic death, Bianca Bennett, 27, posted to Facebook: “Awww can’t wait for my wedding.”
Her finance, Michael Coleman stood stoic outside her St. Albans home, hugging and consoling grieving family members, but was too broken up to talk.
Sources say Bennett was a passenger in a red Dodge Durango driven by another cop when he sped out of control and ran off the roadway at City Island Road and Park Drive around 11:45 a.m.
The car flipped and burst into flames.
“Suddenly, the car exploded. It was like a boom, oh my God,” said Maria Hutapea, 47, who works at Ohana, a Japanese restaurant on City Island.
Bennett, a recent academy graduate assigned to the East Village’s 9th precinct, was pronounced dead at the scene.
Sources say the driver is a 32-year-old off-duty NYPD sergeant assigned to PSA 4, a housing unit. He was rushed to Jacobi Hospital in serious but stable condition with burns over the lower half of his body.
He was pulled from the wreckage by other off-duty NYPD officers who were driving home from the Rodman’s Neck shooting range in the Bronx, where they are assigned.
Sources say they spotted the crash and rushed to help, dragging him out of the burning vehicle.
The good Samaritans were treated for smoke inhalation and other minor injuries also at Jacobi Medical Center.
Our editors found this article on this site using Google and regenerated it for our readers.
