Police chief on leave after 2nd rear-ending

For the second time in less than four years, Kennett Township’s police chief rear-ended another vehicle last week, said state police from the Avondale barracks in an incident report released on Monday, April 20.

Kennett Township Police Chief Albert J. McCarthy
Kennett Township Police Chief Albert J. McCarthy

The report said Albert J. McCarthy, 64, was traveling east on Monday, April 13, at noon on Hillendale Road, east of Greenwood Road in Kennett Township, in a 2015 Ford Taurus when he collided with the 2006 Honda Accord in front of him. The report said both vehicles came to rest at the intersection of Hidden Pond Drive and East Hillendale and were towed from the scene.

Although McCarthy was not injured, the Honda driver, a 61-year-old Kennett Square resident, sustained minor injury, the report said.

“I’m not going to make any comment,” McCarthy said.

Kennett Township Supervisors’ Chairman Scudder Stevens said McCarthy was placed on non-disciplinary administrative leave while the circumstances of the accident are being investigated. He said township officials "are quite saddened by his involvement in another accident" but thankful that there were no serious injuries.

Lt. Richard H. D’Ambrosio, who heads the Avondale barracks, said McCarthy was not cited for the crash because McCarthy may have suffered a momentary seizure caused by a previous brain injury. D’Ambrosio referenced a similar episode in 2011.

D’Ambrosio said evidence at the scene – both vehicles travelling in the same direction at a relatively normal speed when McCarthy rearended the Honda – “tends to point to a medical condition as opposed to an unsafe act.” D’Ambrosio said this type of crash is rare and police “have taken further steps in our investigation that are confidential in nature relating to the chief.”

McCarthy generated headlines on Oct., 12, 2011, when he rear-ended a Jeep on southbound Route 82, south of McFarlan Road, and left the scene. He returned after the other driver called 9-1-1, not realizing that he was responding to a crash he had caused. He later explained that he was being treated for what doctors had determined was a seizure disorder.

 

 

 

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