Driver hits Suffolk police officer, flees scene in DWI

A Long Island woman was charged with drunk driving after she allegedly clipped a police officer with her car on Tuesday afternoon and fled the scene.

According to the Suffolk County Police Department, the police officer, Dennis Hendrickson, was standing on the shoulder of the Long Island Expressway in Hauppauge, west of exit 56, to assist with traffic control after a crash that closed all westbound lanes. At 2:10 p.m., police said, a 2012 Volkswagen rapidly approached Hendrickson, who signaled to the driver to slow down.

Police allege that the driver, 52-year-old Theresa Finnin-Hunt, disregarded those signals and struck Hendrickson on his right arm and hand as he tried to move out of the way. The suspect allegedly did not stop, continuing west on the LIE shoulder before she was stopped on the highway’s north service road in Brentwood, near Wicks Road, shortly afterward.

Finnin-Hunt, a Sea Cliff resident, was arrested and charged with first-degree reckless endangerment, driving while intoxicated, leaving the scene of an accident with personal injury, third-degree unlawful fleeing of a police officer and reckless driving.

Attorney information for the defendant was not immediately available. She was scheduled to be arraigned on Wednesday.

Police said Hendrickson, a member of the SCPD’s 4th Precinct Community Support Unit, was treated for non-life-threatening injuries at Stony Brook University Hospital.