Who is messing with the memory of fallen California Highway Patrolman John Pedro?

Twice in the last three months, memorials to Watsonville-based Pedro, who died on-duty during a 2002 pursuit, have been destroyed.

From the Santa Cruz Sentinel:

Over the weekend, a handmade redwood cross erected in loving memory of officer John Pedro off the Riverside Drive exit along Highway 1 was pulled up.

The cross, along with a planter and flag pole, had been built to honor the Watsonville native, who died in June 2002 after he crashed into a tree while chasing a speeding motorist.

In June, state officials dedicated a section of the state highway between Harkins Slough Road and the Pajaro River Bridge as the John Pedro Memorial Freeway. On Aug. 27, someone chopped down one of the two signs installed along the highway in Pedro’s honor. The vandal returned a short time later, hacked out Pedro’s name, and ran off with it.

“It’s hard to understand,” said Pedro’s widow, Colleen Gilmartin, of the recent theft.

Like her late husband, Gilmartin is a California Highway Patrol officer stationed at the Aptos office.

“After what’s happened now, it makes me feel like it wasn’t such a random act,” she said.

Could this be related to the film “Napoleon Dynamite”? That’s suggested in the story, because a central character in the cult hit is named Pedro.

With a huge enclave of police-hating “progressives” just a few miles away in Santa Cruz, however, one must explore every possibility.

I’m very sorry Colleen Gilmartin has to endure this outrage.

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