Veteran local official dies when car hits supermarket

WEST CHESTER, Pa., Aug. 13 (UPI) -- A longtime township supervisor in a Philadelphia suburb was killed Wednesday when a woman backed her pickup truck into the entrance of a supermarket. Dr. Robert White, 77, a dentist who had been a supervisor in West Goshen for more than two decades, was headed into the ShopRite in West Chester to pick up some lunch, police said. He was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.

The impact pushed White through a front window of the store.

The driver of the pickup truck, described as a woman in her 20s, was being questioned. But investigators said they believe White's death was accidental.

White served as a planning commissioner for 12 years before becoming a township supervisor. West Goshen, southwest of Philadelphia, is a town of about 20,000 that has been ranked by Money magazine as one of the best small towns in the United States.

"It's just a devastating loss for this township," Casey Lalonde, the township manager, told WPVI-TV. "He was intricately involved in this township. It's going to be an extreme loss for this township."