Group Threatens Lawsuit Over Damaged Confederate Statue
Statue Destroyed By Driver Who Fell Asleep
September 22, 2011
REIDSVILLE, N.C. — Four months after a driver crashed into Reidsville’s Confederate monument and toppled it, emotions are still running high over what to do about it.
Monument supporters this week sent the city a letter threatening legal action if the monument isn’t returned to downtown Reidsville, where it stood for more than 100 years.
The group claims the state owns both the statue and the land where it stood and is giving Reidsville leaders 30 days to respond.
"I was really taken aback — actually disappointed that people thought they had to form a political action committee," Reidsville City Manager Michael Pearce said.
City leaders announced in August that they’d reached an agreement with the statue’s owner, the United Daughters of the Confederacy, not to replace the 101-year-old granite statute, which depicts a Confederate soldier.
The statue was destroyed in May when a driver said he fell asleep and his truck plowed into the base of the statue.
The soldier toppled from its post, shattered into several pieces, and its head was embedded in the vehicle.
The driver wasn’t cited in the crash and was traveling at the posted 35 mph speed limit at impact, police said at the time.
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