Kerri Bedrick, of Centerport, indicted on murder charge in wrong-way crash that killed her 9-year-old son

The Centerport mother accused of killing her 9-year-old son in a wrong-way crash on the Southern State Parkway last month was arraigned Wednesday on a 21-count grand jury indictment charging her with depraved-indifference murder.

Kerri A. Bedrick, 32, pleaded not guilty to the indictment, which also charges her with manslaughter, aggravated vehicular homicide and aggravated driving while intoxicated with a child for the Aug. 22 crash, court records show. Prosecutors said Bedrick's blood tested positive for methamphetamines, which her defense attorney and family said she was prescribed.

"This defendant traveled for miles in the wrong direction while impaired by methamphetamine and with her child in the backseat," Suffolk Assistant District Attorney James McCormack told acting State Supreme Court Justice Richard Horowitz during the arraignment in Riverhead. "This horrific crash caused [Bedrick's] child to suffer fatal blunt force injury."

Bedrick faces 25 years to life in prison if convicted of the top charge.

McCormack said last month's crash was not the first time Bedrick attempted to evade police, pointing to additional charges she had faced following a 2012 DWI arrest.

"Her criminal conviction history reveals that the defendant was convicted in 2012 for driving while intoxicated," the prosecutor said. "She was also charged with attempted escape in the second degree and resisting arrest [in 2012]."

Horowitz said that information, combined with her actions on Aug. 22, show she is a flight risk, and ordered her remanded to the Suffolk County jail. Bail had previously been set at $1 million in a lower court, though she has remained in custody.

"Not only does the nature of these charges, in and of themselves, show an unwillingness to submit to the jurisdiction of the court and law enforcement, but I've now been made aware that in her previous driving while intoxicated case, more than 10 years ago, that there was also a charge of unlawfully fleeing and resisting arrest," Horowitz said. "So I'm not convinced that she'd appear."

Horowitz also ordered Bedrick's license to be suspended, which prosecutors said has previously been done 56 times, adding it was already suspended the morning of the 2 a.m. crash. 

Defense attorney Scott Zerner, of Manhattan, said his client is distraught over the loss of her son, Eli Henrys.

"How do you measure how devastated someone is?" Zerner said in response to a television reporter's question about his client's grief. "The maximum amount someone could be devastated?"

Eli was in the back seat of his mother's 2022 Mitsubishi SUV after she allegedly sped west in the eastbound lanes of the parkway near Carleton Avenue in Islip, causing a multicar collision, according to authorities.

A Suffolk deputy sheriff assigned to DWI enforcement spotted her heading west in the eastbound lanes just after 2 a.m. and gave chase, officials said. At one point, according to prosecutors, the officer was also driving the wrong way on the Southern State, trying to pull her over to the shoulder when he had to stop because of oncoming traffic.

McCormack said Bedrick ultimately passed eight cars while speeding up to 100 mph in the opposite direction. Eventually a pickup truck swerved out of Bedrick's way before her vehicle was struck by a Honda Civic that had its passenger-side doors "sheared off," McCormack said.

The crash ended in a head-on collision with a Mercedes SUV in the eastbound middle lane of the parkway.

Two other drivers were injured, police and prosecutors have said.

Bedrick, who police have said was asking officials to help her son as they arrived at the scene, told investigators she had taken methamphetamines at 8 p.m. the day before the crash, McCormack said. First responders tried to revive Eli, who was pronounced dead a short time later at South Shore University Hospital, officials said.

McCormack said the patient's name was ripped off a prescription bottle containing pills that tested positive as methamphetamines.

When asked where she was going, Bedrick said, "I honestly don’t know," McCormack said. Zerner declined to answer that same question outside the courtroom.

Zerner said his client, who appeared in a wheelchair in court, has a number of medical conditions, including spina bifida, narcolepsy and cataplexy. He declined to say for which ailment she was allegedly prescribed methamphetamines. She did not have alcohol in her system, he said.

In pleading with the judge to set cash bail, Zerner called the crash "a horrific accident."

"That's what it was, an accident, a motor vehicle accident," Zerner told Horowitz.

Bedrick's mother, Diane Bedrick, of Riverhead, stood by her daughter's statement that she only used prescription drugs.

"It was prescription medications and she's devastated just like the rest of us," Diane Bedrick said.

She described her grandson as an "innocent, sweet boy."

 Bedrick is also facing felony charges for assault and unlawful fleeing an officer, along with more than a half-dozen misdemeanor charges related to the fatal crash.

Bedrick also has eight other open cases since 2023 for aggravated driving without a license, according to court records. She faces misdemeanor charges in those cases. 

By Grant Parpan

grant.parpan@newsday.com@GrantParpan

Grant Parpan covers Suffolk County courts and federal courts for Newsday. A Long Island native, he joined Newsday in 2022.