crimes and misdemeanors

Kerry Kennedy Not Guilty in Ambien-Related DUI

Kerry Kennedy, daughter of assassinated Senator Robert F. Kennedy and the ex-wife of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, arrives to the Westchester County Courthouse in White Plains, New York, February 24, 2014. Kennedy, 54, is charged with one count of driving while impaired, a misdemeanor. No one was injured in the accident in a suburb of New York City. Kennedy initially said a partial seizure was to blame but a toxicology report showed that she had sleeping medication in her system.
Photo: EDUARDO MUNOZ/Reuters/Corbis

Kerry Kennedy initially said a seizure had probably caused her to crash into a truck on Interstate 684 in 2012. But another theory won out: She was on the sleeping medication Ambien, which she said she had taken accidentally instead of her thyroid medication. On Friday, a jury concluded that she was right, and acquitted JFK’s niece (also Governor Andrew Cuomo’s ex-wife) of the misdemeanor charge that could have landed her in jail for a year.

Kerry Kennedy Not Guilty in Ambien-Related DUI