By Tom Haydon The Star-Ledger
Vandals may have damaged the Westfield September 11 memorial where one of four glass panels bearing the names of victims was struck and shattered in to a spider web of cracks, police said.
The damage was discovered Wednesday and was recorded by police as criminal mischief, but there were no witnesses or evidence of who might have defaced the memorial at the memorial North Avenue and Broad Street, police Capt. Scott Roger said.
Built in September 2002 shortly before the first anniversary of the attacks, the four panels — each 6 feet high and all mounted on 3-four by 6-foot granite base — are etched with the names of those who died September 11 at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and in Shanksville, Pa.
Along the stone walk that passes in front of the granite and glass memorial — a path used by hundreds of commuters every morning on their way to Manhattan — there are 12 smaller monuments engraved with the names of those grew up or lived in Westfield and died in the attacks.
Township officials last week were getting estimates of the cost to repair the monument.
