Kerry Kennedy arrested for driving while impaired

NEW YORK, United States of America – Kerry Kennedy, the daughter of slain US political icon Robert F. Kennedy, was arrested Friday after she was in a car crash in New York and found to be driving while impaired by drugs, police said.

The Lexus driven by Kennedy collided with a tractor-trailer on an interstate highway in Westchester county north of New York City and the 52-year-old then left the scene of the accident, state police said in a statement.

She was found in her vehicle at a highway exit, shortly after the incident. Calls to emergency hotline 911 reported she was driving “in an erratic manner in the southbound lanes” of the highway, police said.

“State police arrived and a subsequent investigation found Kennedy to be operating the motor vehicle while her ability was impaired by drugs.”

New York state police declined to offer more details about the incident when contacted by AFP. The type of drugs taken by Kennedy was not revealed.

Kennedy’s arrest represents the latest blow for the storied and troubled US political clan.

She is a daughter of Robert F. Kennedy, a civil rights activist and US attorney general under his brother, slain president John F. Kennedy, who was himself shot dead in 1968 when he was running for the White House.

In May, Mary Richardson Kennedy, the 52-year-old estranged wife of Robert F. Kennedy Jr, committed suicide by hanging herself at her home in Bedford, New York.

A writer and human rights advocate, Kennedy was married to New York Governor Andrew Cuomo from 1991 to 2003. – Agence France-Presse