Rachel Uchitel,9/11 mourner now allegedly linked to Tiger Woods
Rachel Uchitel,9/11 mourner now allegedly linked to Tiger Woods
Ms. Uchitel, 34, appears in one of the most striking images captured after Sept. 11. After airplanes crashed into the World Trade Center towers, a photographer found the young woman standing outside New York's Bellevue Hospital, overcome with emotion as she searched for James Andrew O'Grady, her fiancé. Her engagement ring sparkled beside the flyer she held; it bore a picture of him smiling. Mr. O'Grady had the ring made for her a month before he died. Rachel Uchitel,9/11 mourner now allegedly linked to Tiger Woods.Twenty six years old at the time, Ms. Uchitel was working as a TV producer with Bloomberg in New York. Mr. O'Grady, 32, was a managing director of fixed-income sales for Sandler O'Neill & Partners on the 104th floor of the World Trade Center's south tower. The pair met on a blind date. According to The New York Times' Pulitzer Prize-winning series about Sept. 11 victims, "Portraits of Grief," Ms. Uchitel had just gotten off the phone with Mr. O'Grady, who had joked with her about where she had left the towels that morning. They had recently returned from a 10-day vacation in Greece. Rachel Uchitel,9/11 mourner now allegedly linked to Tiger Woods
Mr. O'Grady's body was found a few months later. It was not until two years after the attacks that Ms. Uchitel experienced an emotional breakdown, left her job and sought therapy. "I felt like everyone had forgotten about it," she told The New York Times in 2004. "I was resentful. Lonely."
The crash occurred at 2:20 a.m. near his home, and he was taken to Health Central Hospital with facial lacerations. Woods struck a fire hydrant and then a tree on a neighbor's property. Police say alcohol was not a factor.
According to ESPN, the police report reads, "driver had just pulled out of the driveway at his residence ... as [vehicle] began to drive on Deacon Circle, [vehicle] struck a fire hydrant. The front of [vehicle] then struck a tree."
He was driving a 2009 Cadillac SUV. Here's wishing Woods a speedy recovery. Rachel Uchitel,9/11 mourner now allegedly linked to Tiger Woods
