The 3-year-old Bernedoodle joined the Wilmington Police Department in 2022, when she was 8 weeks old
NEED TO KNOW
- Wilmington, Mass., is mourning the loss of Zena, a 3-year-old police therapy dog killed in a two-car crash on Sept. 23
- Zena and handler Samantha Cavanaugh, who was in the car with the dog during the crash, worked with the Wilmington Police’s Health & Recovery Unit
Wilmington, Mass., residents are mourning the death of a police therapy dog named Zena, who died as a result of a two-vehicle car crash on Tuesday, Sept. 23, at approximately 8 a.m.
According to a Wilmington Police press release obtained by PEOPLE, the incident occurred in Tewksbury when a Mazda 3, driven by a 26-year-old woman, allegedly crossed the double yellow line in the road, striking the Toyota Camry of Samantha Cavanaugh, a clinician with the Wilmington Police Department and Zena’s handler. Zena was also in the car with Cavanaugh.
Because of Massachusetts’s Nero’s Law, which allows service animals to be transported in an ambulance when they are injured in the line of duty, first responders took Zena via ambulance to Bulger Animal Hospital in Lawrence.
The Bernedoodle was announced dead at the hospital. She was three years old…