Kerry Kennedy gave herself a hearty round of applause as jurors Friday found her not guilty of drugged driving.
Kennedy, daughter of the late Robert F. Kennedy, began clapping minutes after Supreme Court Justice Robert Neary dismissed the six-person panel from his Westchester County courtroom around 10:15 am.
Her lawyers, mom Ethel Kennedy and a squad of Kennedy cheerleaders joined in the ovation.
“I’m happy that justice was done,” Kennedy said before leaving the courtroom.
Asked if she was angry at prosecutors for trying the case, Kennedy rested her hand on a reporter’s forearm, leaned in conspiratorially and said, “I have to tell you the truth. Anger is the last feeling I have right now. Right now I’m full of gratitude.”
The verdict came after just 30 minutes of deliberation Friday morning. The panel also deliberated about 45 minutes Thursday.
Kennedy, 54, had faced up to a year in jail if convicted on the misdemeanor.
Outside court, Kennedy’s mom and family matriarch Ethel Kennedy, 85, said she was ready to “celebrate.”
“I want to say thank you to the jury for returning this verdict,” Kerry Kennedy gushed. “I want to really thank my extraordinary lawyers … The best, the best. I want to thank my family and my friends, my mother Ethel Kennedy, and Cara Kennedy Cuomo, my daughters, everybody who’s been so supportive.”
“We need to take a hard look at our criminal justice system in the United States to ensure it really is just and that everyone in our country has true access to justice.”
The family was escorted away from the courthouse by Westchester County cops.
Both sides in the misdemeanor case had conceded Kennedy mistakenly popped a generic Ambien instead of her morning thyroid pill in July 2012, before setting off in her Lexus SUV onto I-684 in an erratic, dangerous five-mile drive in which she sideswiped a tractor trailer and kept going.
Kennedy’s jubilant lawyers, who blatantly played the “Kennedy family” card to defend their client during the trial, incredulously blamed the same card for the case being prosecuted.
“You’ve got to wonder why an ill-advised prosecution like this was brought,” Kennedy lawyer Gerald Lefcourt said outside court, slamming the prosecution as “appalling.”
“Is it because of who the defendant is? They concede that this was an accident and nevertheless they pursued this case. I find this very depressing and we’re just grateful that the jury saw through it all and justice was done.’’
“We made it very clear from the outset an in our papers that all we asked the prosecution to do was view her as if her name were ‘Mary Housewife,’” Kennedy lawyer William Aronwald said. “We did not ask for any special treatment…that they took the hardline position they did suggests they were the ones who treated this case differently because of who she was.’’
“We prosecute 2,500 impaired driving cases annually,” a spokesman for the Westchester County District Attorney said after the verdict.
“This case was treated no differently from any of the others. The jury heard all the evidence in the case and we respect their verdict.”
Immediately following the accident in 2012, terrified witnesses recalled how Kennedy hit the tractor trailer, blew a tire and kept driving for miles on a smoking tire rim — cutting off fellow drivers and swerving in and out of lanes. Exiting the freeway, Kennedy reversed into a guardrail before being found slumped over the wheel at an intersection at Route 22. She failed field and sobriety tests.
Prosecutors had argued that Kennedy, an admitted 10-year Ambien user, must have felt the effects of the pill before losing consciousness – and broke the law by failing to pull over.
Kennedy produced a doctor to testify who said Kennedy’s Ambien use could cause ‘zombie-ism” resulting in “sleep driving.”
To find Kennedy guilty of misdemeanor impaired driving, jurors had to find Kennedy realized she was drugged and decided to stay on the road.
During the trial, jurors were bombarded with testimony from Kennedy pals vouching for her good deeds. Kennedy herself took the stand and played the “daddy” card, reminding jurors she was just eight years old when her father was assassinated.
The exasperated judge repeatedly reminded Lefcourt to trim the character-witness testimony and biographical details.