SEATTLE — A 28-year-old Bellingham, Wash., woman has been sentenced to a year in prison after being convicted earlier this year for using a shunt to disrupt signals on a BNSF Railway line in Bellingham.
Ellen Brennan Reiche, 28, also was given three years of supervised probation and 100 hours of community service in sentencing Friday by U.S. District Judge Ricardo S. Martinez. She could have been sentenced to up to 20 years in prison.
Reiche had been convicted in September of violence against a railroad for the Nov. 28, 2020, incident in which video surveillance recorded Reiche and co-defendant Samantha Frances Brooks on the tracks near a grade crossing in Bellingham [see “Washington woman convicted …,” Trains News Wire, Sept. 9, 2021]. When Whatcom County Sheriff’s deputies responded, they found the shunt — a wire device which mimics the presence of a train, triggering signals — on the tracks, where it could have interfered with nearby grade-crossing warnings.
“Placing a shunt on active railroad tracks puts lives in danger – to drivers preparing to cross the tracks who may not get any warning lights of an approaching train, and to the homeowners in the area who could be endangered by a train derailment,” U.S. Attorney Nick Brown said in a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Washington. “In this case the shunt was placed just prior to the arrival of a train with 97 tanker cars loaded with crude oil. Thankfully, the device was discovered and removed before it could cause a tragedy.”
Brooks, 24, had previously pleaded guilty to a terrorism charge and violence against a railroad [see “Washington woman pleads guilty …,” News Wire, Aug. 3, 2021], and in October was sentenced to six months of prison and three years of probation; that period will include four months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service.
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