A hero New Jersey police officer who helped capture the suspected Chelsea bomber after a three day manhunt which ended in a shootout, has been arrested for DWI.
Angel Padilla was driving in Linden on Saturday in his Jeep when he collided with a 54-year-old woman driving a Cadillac driving in the same direction. The woman was evaluated at the scene and treated for minor injuries.
Padilla, a 17-year-veteran with the Linden Police Department, was not injured in the crash.
The responding officer recognized him and called Padilla’s supervisor who took over the investigation according NBC4 New York.
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Linden Police Officer Angel Padilla (left) was hailed a hero for his role in capturing suspected terrorist Ahmad Khan Rahimi (right) in 2016. Padilla was arrested Saturday for DWI in New Jersey
Rahmini is suspected of planting three bombs in New York and New Jersey, one of which detonated in Chelsea, New York (pictured) injuring 30 people
Padilla was shot in the torso during the shootout with suspected bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi on September 19, 2016, after a nation wide search.
He and his partner had noticed the man they recognized as Rahmini, known as the chicken shop terrorist, sleeping on the steps of a bar in Linden.
When the officers woke him up, he fired rounds at them, striking Padilla in the torso while his partner suffered a bullet graze to the hand.
He and his partner received national accolades for the capture of Rahimi in the days that followed a pressure bomb exploding in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan.
The bomb went off leaving 30 people with minor injuries.
Two other bombs were also attributed to Rahimi, one in Elizabeth New Jersey the previous night and another that was not detonated in Seaside Park the following day.
Two other bombs besides the blast in Chelsea were attributed to Rahimi, one in Elizabeth, NJ and the other in Seaside Park, NJ
Rahmini’s New York terror trial is expected to begin next year
Officer Padilla was arrested on DWI charges on Saturday in Linden, NJ
The style of bombings in Seaside Park, New Jersey and the Chelsea neighborhood reminded investigators of the Boston Marathon bombings.
Investigators believe Rahami may have been trying to mimic Boston Bombing brothers Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who also used bombs made from pressure cookers. In both cases, the bombers had recently returned to their home countries.
Shortly before the blast, a man believed to be Rahami was seen on surveillance footage walking down 23rd Street in Chelsea, dragging a wheeled bag behind him. That bag, police say, contained the shrapnel-packed pressure-cooker explosive which he used in the attack.
An unexploded pressure-cooker bomb was found blocks away and police say they were able to link the fingerprints on the homemade explosive to Rahami.
Rahimi, who ran his family’s fried chicken shop, underwent extensive surgeries after being shot 10 times in the shootout.
The Afghanistan-born US citizen plead not guilty to terror and attempted murder of police officers. His terror trial is scheduled to begin next year.
Padilla was released and expected in court on his DWI charge.