Following a two day court-martial, a military judge found Pvt. Kristopher Hendricks guilty of driving while intoxicated in New York and injuring eight people when he plowed into a crowd leaving a night club. Hendricks, 23, was given a bad conduct discharge from the Army and sentenced to 18 months in prison. He was also ordered to forfeit his pay and Army benefits.
Hendricks hit another vehicle around 2:00 am with his 1995 Cadillac while in the Watertown City Hall parking lot on March 15. He fled the scene and sped down a street in the wrong direction. A large crowd of soldiers was leaving a dance club at that time and Hendricks hit eight people and crashed into a chain link fence.
According to the police arrest report, Hendricks had a blood alcohol content of 0.10%. The legal limit for drunk driving in New York is 0.08%. Hendricks originally had 14 civilian criminal charges filed against him, including felony New York DWI. Prosecutors, however, turned the case over to the military because Hendricks and the victims were all soldiers at Fort Drum.
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