Gabe Grunewald's sister, Abigail Anderson passed away

This is beyond heartbreaking. Years ago I used to live and run in that area when I worked in Minneapolis, which makes it even more surreal.

And the scariest thing is it appears she followed all the rules and didn't do anything wrong - she was on the grass/sidewalk next to the road, and there is a 2-3 ft shoulder/buffer as well. It's not like she was brushing up against traffic and drifting into the road.

The most heartbreaking thing of all is that the sorry sack of shyte driver hit her a second time while trying to flee the scene of the accident. It's possible Abby may have survived if the driver stopped, got out and called 911 immediately. Should be a mandatory life sentence in a perfect world.

RIP.

im here to help wrote:

she didn't pass away. she was murdered by a drunk driver.

this, x100000.

Anyone know why the drunk drivers name is never mentioned, only the person who is hit/killed?

Why does the culprit get the anonymity?

saddened wrote:

Anyone know why the drunk drivers name is never mentioned, only the person who is hit/killed?

Why does the culprit get the anonymity?

This says that the driver submitted to a blood test but has not been charged pending the results. Results could take up to two weeks! Why does it take so long?

Hasn't been charged yet

it's crazy the driver hasn't been charged yet regardless of whether or not they were drunk

im here to help wrote:

she didn't pass away. she was murdered by a drunk driver.

+1.

A related pet peeve of mine is the use of the expression that one was "killed by a car." No. they were killed by a person. If your friend gets stabbed to death, you don't go around telling people that "Dave was killed by a knife." A knife didn't up and kill your friend of its own volition, and a car didn't fling itself into Abby all by itself. A human being in the act of committing multiple felonies killed Abby.

This may seem nit picky or pedantic, but I think it actually matters because this kind of euphemism both reflects and contributes to our culture's willingness to accept horrific acts simply because a car was involved. The phrase I mention shifts blame from a human being to an inanimate object. The phrase the above poster is objecting to avoids the fact that anything blameworthy has happened altogether. We as a society have a bafflingly high threshold for the behavior we're willing to tolerate from people who are behind the wheel of a car, and softening the discussion of these events doesn't help.

This is such a nightmare… I cannot fathom this actually happened.. and to this family.

The fact that such awful things happened to a 29 and 32 year old woman (GG & Abigail) absolutely break my heart. As a 33 year female runner who has followed the running scene this really breaks my heart. Additionally..I’m tired of seeing the defendants/perps get away with hurting innocent people. Their conscious will certainly be their own personal hell.

RIP to both sisters and I pray for peace for the families affected. I think of Gabe often and I will now include Abby in those thoughts.

Iameasy2find wrote:

This is such a nightmare… I cannot fathom this actually happened.. and to this family.

The fact that such awful things happened to a 29 and 32 year old woman (GG & Abigail) absolutely break my heart. As a 33 year female runner who has followed the running scene this really breaks my heart. Additionally..I’m tired of seeing the defendants/perps get away with hurting innocent people. Their conscious will certainly be their own personal hell.

RIP to both sisters and I pray for peace for the families affected. I think of Gabe often and I will now include Abby in those thoughts.

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but people who do things like this rarely feel remorse. They might feel bad for the victim but they will rarely acknowledge their own responsibility - unless it's necessary to get a lighter sentence.

I ran with both the Anderson sisters (Anderson was Gabe's maiden name) at UMN. Our team ( and many other teams on meet days) use to run on that grass where she was on the outside perimeter of the university golf course on our warm-ups for workouts and meets there, so this hits close to home. I've run in that exact spot hundreds of times. Had a practice been in session at the time with runners warming up, he might have killed a whole pack of people. To add some perspective to this, this road is like a typical square grid, one lane each way, neighborhood type blvd with a speed limit of 30. Clearly the driver did not have a medical incident most likely as he was able to do a U turn and drive away after the first hit, so he most likely was very drunk/distracted/impaired in some way to crash on a straight road with such a slow speed limit with that much space and barriers between the road and where he ended up in the fence. Or the guy is just pure evil and wanted to hurt her which is much less likely. It's unfathonably infuriating that he hit her a SECOND TIME trying to turn around the drive away. Abbie was such a happy upbeat person who was just fun to be around. I feel terrible that her family has to suffer her loss now just two years after losing her older sister to cancer. I hope the driver is chargred to the fullest extent. RIP abby.

BennyB wrote:

God this is so sad. Don't drink/drug and drive, people.

Anyone who’s ever worn a Prefontaine t-shirt should be forced to read this story.

hobby jogging harry wrote:

[quote]BennyB wrote:

God this is so sad. Don't drink/drug and drive, people.

+ a billion. Don't drive drunk. Don't drive buzzed. Don't drive tipsy.

Huge difference between driving drunk and driving buzzed.

Nearly all drunk driving accidents are with drivers with blood alcohol content way above legal limit.

You're nuts. A drunk driver who kills someone else will certainly feel remorse. These are not pols and lobbyists pushing to attack other nations, killing thousands of people. Those psychos are never held to account and never feel a bit of remorse

Yeah I have run by there too, lots of runners esp during the Griak etc. Whereas some of you get sad, this type of thing makes me mad. The criminal justice system will kick in, but MN sentencing guidelines will rule the day:

So incredibly sorry for the family. I will run Gabe’s route when I get home, and try to find some way to help. This really sucks. RIP

Memorial page

The Unkle wrote:

bladerunner wrote:

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but people who do things like this rarely feel remorse. They might feel bad for the victim but they will rarely acknowledge their own responsibility - unless it's necessary to get a lighter sentence.

You're nuts. A drunk driver who kills someone else will certainly feel remorse. These are not pols and lobbyists pushing to attack other nations, killing thousands of people. Those psychos are never held to account and never feel a bit of remorse

Are you serious?? What an absolutely ridiculous statement.. certainly the qualities of empathy/compassion/personal responsibility are not even remotely evenly distributed among homo sapiens. You for example don't seem to understand how inappropriate it is to pollute a thread about the senseless death of a vibrant young woman with your political views; perhaps some therapy would be in order?

Some drivers most certainly would be devastated to know they've killed someone, some might be so narcissistic/sociopathic as to feel remorse mostly due to the fact that they've screwed up their own lives, and some (albeit a small number) might be so screwed up as to feel very little at all. The responses would run the gamut of human emotion.

I agree with a previous post regarding the shocking tolerance Americans hold for acts committed behind the wheel of an automobile; kill someone with a gun and go to prison for years, kill them while driving drunk, totally different story. We need to REALLY start holding people accountable and send serious messages about what a civilized society will and will not tolerate regarding automobile related crimes.

My heart goes out to this innocent person, her family, and her friends. What a tragic and awful waste.

There ought to be a petition to add her name to the Roy Griak cross country meet. This happened at the site of that race. It would be a terrible shame to gather thousands of runners to this spot annually and NOT recognize this family and the tragedy that every runner should know and remember. This could have been any of us.

As a gopher alum, this seems like the least the UMN XC program could do.

One thing the president could do to throttle gasonline consumption would be to limit the amount of valid driver's licenses per state and coerce transport as a priority service.

Chalk it up as the most B.S. global warming initiative but let it ride out as an omnibus.

Because there are way too many reckless drivers out there on edge, racing the road like nascar and making the road a much more dangerous place than it has to be just like this P.O.S. This guy senselessly devastates a family already devastated. There were likely signs beforehand that he doesnt need or qualify to be on the road. People like this shouldn't be allowed to drive.

Limit the licenses. Revoke privileges for minor infractions. Get everyone to slow the F down and car pool. Drive sensibly.

This is too much. Are there other children in the family? RIP