Chilling 911 audio reveals woman’s terror saying bus driver locked her in underside luggage compartment and took off down interstate to Boston – as prosecutors DROP all charges in case
- Connecticut State Police this week released the 911 audio from August incident
- Woman locked in luggage compartment of bus pleads for help from cops
- Caller says the Peter Pan bus driver locked her in and drove off toward Boston
- Prosecutors have now dropped charges against driver Wendy Helena Alberty, 49
- She had been charged with reckless endangerment and unlawful arrest
- Alberty’s lawyer says there was no evidence the driver acted intentionally
Wendy Helena Alberty, 49, has been cleared of criminal charges in the case
Police have released 911 call audio from a woman saying a commercial bus driver locked her in the underside luggage compartment of the bus.
Connecticut State Police this week released the 911 audio from the August incident after all charges were dropped against Peter Pan Bus Lines driver Wendy Helena Alberty, 49.
Alberty had been charged with reckless endangerment, unlawful restraint and breach of peace, but her lawyer argued that she did nothing intentional or unlawful.
The incident unfolded in August 4, when a New York woman called 911 saying she’d been locked inside the compartment of the bus in Hartford, Connecticut while she was retrieving items from her bag.
A Peter Pan bus is seen in a file photo at the station in Hartford, Connecticut, where a female passenger was locked in the underside luggage compartment of a bus bound for Boston
‘The bus driver locked me underneath the bus, um, a Peter Pan bus going en route to Boston,’ the 32-year-old woman told the dispatcher.
The dispatcher reacts with disbelief before comprehending the woman’s meaning.
‘Yes. Yes. I’m under the bus with the luggage and I’m afraid. I don’t know if she’s gonna ever let – like – I need help. Nobody knows where I am,’ the caller says.
‘I’m so scared. Please help,’ the woman says.
The bus, which was en route to Boston, was tracked down and later intercepted by officers on Interstate 84 near the town of Willington, in Connecticut.
Troopers said the woman was unharmed during the incident and refused the option to be looked-over by medical professionals.
Alberty, who was then riding as a passenger on the bus, was then arrested by state troopers.
An unidentified male driver who was behind the wheel at the time of the arrest did not face any charges.
A Peter Pan bus is seen in the New York Station in this file photo. The region bus service has routes through the northeast from Washington DC to Boston
Two months after the incident, all charges against Alberty were dropped.
‘From my perspective, she should have never been arrested,’ Alberty’s attorney Nate Baber told People.
‘She’s gone through a lot over the last couple of months … I’m not sure the damage can ever be undone, but she’s happy that she at least doesn’t have to deal with this aspect of it.’
‘She’s relieved that the state did the right thing and dropped the charges,’ Baber explains. ‘But she’s still upset and disappointed that she’s ever been put in this situation in the first place.’
Alberty has been suspended from her job at Peter Pan pending the criminal case, but Baber says that she hopes to soon be reinstated now that charges have been dropped.