RONKONKOMA, New York (AP) -- Five teenagers were arrested in the hurling of a frozen turkey that smashed through a motorist's windshield, critically injuring her.

Police said Ryan Cushing, 18, threw the turkey from a car he and the other teens were riding in Saturday. It smashed through the car window of a 44-year-old woman who was driving in the other direction. She was in critical condition at Stony Brook University Hospital.

Cushing was arrested on charges of first-degree assault, reckless endangerment, forgery, criminal mischief and criminal possession of stolen property. He and the other teens allegedly stole a credit card to buy the turkey at a supermarket. The other four teens were charged with criminal possession of stolen property.

Ronkonkoma is in the approximate geographic center of New York's Long Island, about 50 miles east of New York City.

Members of a heartless Long Island gang that hurled a 20-pound turkey through a driver's windshield were nabbed last night as the victim lay in a coma, cops said.

Nearly every bone in the woman's face was broken when the bird was tossed from a moving car - hitting her with a force equivalent to a bowling ball dropped from a 20-story building and causing her to lose control of the steering wheel. Suffolk Detective Sgt. William Lamb said five teens were under arrest, including the suspected turkey tosser, Farmingdale State University student Ryan Cushing, 18, of Huntington, who was charged with first-degree assault.
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Doctors said it was too early to tell whether the 44-year-old woman suffered significant brain damage in Saturday's attack on Portion Road in Lake Ronkonkoma. The Daily News is withholding her name at the request of her family.
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Earlier, the gang had smashed a car window and stolen a purse containing a credit card from a car parked outside a multiplex movie theater. The youths first went to two nearby Blockbuster Video stores, then moved on to a Waldbaum's supermarket, where they used the card to buy a heap of groceries, cops said. Among the purchases was a 20-pound fresh turkey.

She has a broken nose, top jaw is broken, fracture of the lower jaw, her jaw needs to be wired, she needs a tracheotomy." Chief Jerry Curtain of the Farmingdale Fire Department says, "It's like a cinder block coming through your window at 80 miles an hour."