US ambassador Douglas Kmiec returns to Malta

Ambassador Kmiec was reported to have sufficiently recovered from the trauma surgery he underwent following the traffic accident in the coastal canyons of southern California on 25 August.

Although he has resumed his responsibilities as chief of the US embassy in Malta, additional surgery will be required in a few months.

Kmiec expressed his happiness to be back in his “Maltese home”. “He is looking forward to catching up with his friends and colleagues and resuming his busy schedule at the U.S. Embassy,” am embassy spokesperson said.

“In these times of unspeakable grief and pain, I have been physically sustained by the competence and care of doctors and nurses, and emotionally and spiritually renewed by the compassion and prayers of the people of Malta,” Kmiec said in a statement.

“I lost two of my closest friends in this accident, and I feel a special obligation to advance the goodness and kindness that their lives represented. This is a diplomat who is now living for three.”

Monsignor John Sheridan, 94, and Sister Mary Campbell, 74, were passengers in Kmiec’s car in a car accident that killed Campbell on the spot. Sheridan died of heart failure after succumbing to injuries sustained in a car accident a few days later.

Kmiec, 58, was driving when the vehicle drifted onto a dirt shoulder and struck a drainage ditch on Mulholland Highway east of Stokes Canyon Road, the California Highway Patrol said. He suffered major injuries and was transported to a hospital.

Sheridan, who served as Our Lady of Malibu’s pastor from 1965-1991, was in the hospital, much of the time in an induced coma, after having suffered major injuries. He was in the front seat.

The three had attended an anniversary celebration at a Woodland Hills high school and were returning to the church when the crash occurred.

The ambassador was nominated by President Obama to serve as the Ambassador to Malta on July 2, 2009.