An Illinois State Police trooper was killed early Saturday when a driver going the wrong way slammed into his squad car. The crash marks the third Illinois trooper death this year, and the second in just three days.
Trooper Gerald Ellis, 36, was referred to as “a great hero” by his colleagues. He was on duty and heading home in his squad car on Interstate 94 when a wrong-way driver hit his vehicle about 3:25 a.m.
Ellis, an 11-year State Police veteran, died at the hospital less than an hour later.
Ellis was also a military veteran, and he leaves behind a wife and two children.
Illinois State Police Director Brendan Kelly called the loss “a bitter salt in an open wound.”
On Thursday, Trooper Brooke Jones-Story was killed when a truck struck her in Freeport. In January, a vehicle hit Trooper Christopher Lambert near Northbrook.
