Friggin' dumbass. I don't know why there is a place in our society for people that do stuff like this.

A motorist drove a car through West Virginia's open-air, pedestrians-only Veterans Memorial early Sunday morning, damaging at least one black granite panel that lists the state's war dead, authorities said. State Administration Secretary Rob Ferguson, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran, described the damage as extensive.

"There's got to be a couple hundred thousand dollars worth of damage,'' Ferguson said as he surveyed the memorial. "They really took it out.''

Artist P. Joseph Mullins, who designed the memorial and sculpted its four statues, was pleased the damage was not worse. Besides the cracked panel, the memorial had red paint scrapes and at least two limestone barricades were knocked over.

"It suffered the slings and arrows of this outrage,'' said Mullins, a U.S. Army veteran. "It has to withstand the Visigoths, and it stood up pretty well in this instance.''

The Charleston Police Department cited Newton resident Howard Roland Gentry, 59, for leaving the scene of an accident and failure to maintain control. A voicemail message left at Gentry's residence was not immediately returned.

A police complaint alleges Gentry drove onto the Capitol Complex sometime between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. and tried unsuccessfully to drive his Subaru up the steps of the state Cultural Center.

Next, Gentry allegedly drove across the grounds, knocked over a limestone barricade and drove through the memorial.

After exiting on the other side, Gentry allegedly knocked over a second limestone barricade and a light pole, according to the complaint. Gentry left the Capitol Complex and drove onto Interstate 77, where he was stopped at the Westmoreland Road exit approximately three miles away.

Mullins said steel and glass bridges that cross the memorial's reflecting pool must be inspected for structural damage because they were not designed to hold vehicles.

Left unscathed were the memorial's four bronze statues, each representing both a branch of the U.S. military and the four major wars of the 1900s.

The black granite panels line the interiors of the four limestone columns and list the more than 10,000 West Virginians killed during the U.S. conflicts of the 20th Century. Dedicated in 1995, the memorial has become a popular feature of the state Capitol Complex. The state has been raising funds to correct misspellings and add names to the panels.

http://www.wvgazette.com/section/News/2007032517

http://news.aol.com/photos/_p/veterans-mem...325163009990004