Group protests memorial service of family killed in wrong way crash?

Pardon the French, but sometimes you really do have to ask WTF?

http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080108/NEWS14/456507462

Group protests memorial of Maryland family killed in Toledo crash

ASSOCIATED PRESS

BALTIMORE — The memorial service Tuesday for five members of a Maryland family killed by a wrong-way truck in a Toledo highway accident included some uninvited guests.

Three members of the Kansas-based Westboro Baptist Church, known for protests at military funerals, demonstrated about a block from St. Luke Evangelical Lutheran Church, the site of the service.

The demonstrators said the deaths are God’s retribution against the community for a recent $11 million jury award against the Kansas group. A federal jury in Baltimore made the award in October to Albert Snyder, of York, Pa., who sued after the group protested his son’s military funeral in Maryland.

The community is going to “pay the price” for persecuting his group for preaching the word of God, said demonstrator Fred Phelps.

A mother and four children died in the Dec. 30 crash on Interstate 280 in Toledo, which police said was caused by a drunken driver.

On Monday, a Toledo hospital released 8-year-old Sydney Griffin of Parkville, who was being treated for injuries sustained in the crash.

Michael Gagnon of Adrian, Mich., appeared briefly in a Toledo courtroom Tuesday, and a preliminary hearing on five counts of aggravated vehicular homicide was continued to Thursday.

Gagnon’s blood-alcohol level was more than three times the legal limit when he slammed his pickup truck into the family’s minivan, police said.