Chicago Cop’s Wife Found Guilty in 2013 DUI Crash That Killed Two Women

CHICAGO, IL -- A Cook County jury handed a guilty verdict on Friday to the wife of a Chicago police officer for her role in a 2013 Lyons drunken driving crash that killed two friends.

Prosecutors said that 47-year-old Lisa Elner was behind the wheel of a van in the early morning hours of Jan. 26, 2013, after a night of drinking and drugging at a Berwyn bar, when the van plummeted 50 feet off the Harlem Avenue bridge in Lyons.

After the crash, prosecutors said that Elner walked away from the scene. Illinois State Troopers found her several hours later, in shock and with frostbitten hands. She reportedly told police she was walking home because she had been drinking in Berwyn and was too drunk to drive. She was taken to a nearby hospital for treatment.

The accident went unreported for ten hours, until a trucker called police to report a van lying on its roof below the bridge. Inside were the bodies of Michelle Miranda, 37, of Berwyn, and 36-year-old Sandra Frankum, a mother of four children from Bolingbrook.

For the ten hours that Elner was being treated at the hospital, prosecutors sad she never mentioned the crash or her friends.

Lyons police began piecing together Elner’s possible involvement in the crash when they saw fresh footprints in the snow walking up the embankment toward the area where Elner had been found, the Chicago Tribune reported.

Elner turned herself into Lyons police weeks later, where she was charged with two counts of failure to report an accident involving death, two counts of aggravated driving under the influence involving death, possession of a cocaine and assorted traffic charges

During the trial, prosecutors said the Elner was drunk and high on cocaine when she and the two other women left for another bar in Summit, boasting that she had her husband’s business card, according to the Chicago Tribune.

"She grabbed the keys at the bar and said she was OK to drive and that she had her 'cop card,' " Cook County Assistant State's Attorney Michael Deno said.

Elner’s attorney said the state’s two witnesses were also drunk when they allegedly saw the three women leaving the bar in Berwyn, the Chicago Tribune reported. The eyewitnesses were also unable to identify Elner in a police photo lineup.

It took the jury more than six hours to arrive at a verdict on Friday. Cook County Judge Colleen Hyland revoked Elner’s bail.

Elner’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for Oct. 28 in Bridgeview.