Slaying the demons of 2011 in Times Square

Hundreds of people converged on Times Square Wednesday for a single purpose: to destroy this year's bad memories and regrets as they prepare for the new year.

From all over they came bearing utility bills, failed exams, bad medical records, names of exes and other items. The loathsome objects were fed into an industrial paper shredder or smashed with a mallet.

The gleeful destruction was organized by the Times Square Alliance, which held its fifth annual Good Riddance event in conjunction with Cintas, a document management company.

Katie Selman, winner of Cintas' online contest, arrived with her husband, Army Maj. Steve Selman, from Tampa, Fla., to shred his and her brother's military deployment papers.

"My husband and my brother actually got deployed in 2011 to the Middle East, and I'm here to say goodbye to that, to mark this moment of 2012," Katie Selman said, adding that she hopes for "more family memories, together" in the new year.

Robert Santoriella, of Westchester, with a single mallet stroke, smashed a plastic bin that his son Jake, 10, used to vomit in on the drive home after his chemotherapy treatment for leukemia. Jake recently received a bone-marrow transplant from his brother, a fraternal twin.

"He's in remission. We played ice hockey together," Santoriella said. "Chase, his brother, is my hero. He saved his life."

Many people said good riddance to an ex-significant other, including Bekah Francois, 22, an event promoter from Brooklyn who discarded a pink motorcycle helmet she used when riding with her ex-boyfriend, whom she called a "liar." The impact-resistant helmet didn't yield to her mallet blows, so she tossed it in a nearby trash bin.

Others bid farewell to "being single" -- a message they wrote out on blank sheets of paper that they then ripped up and tossed in a bin, to be shredded.

Lori Raimondo, vice president of marketing for the Times Square Alliance, said the event was part of the reflection and renewal that come with New Year's Eve.

"The whole idea is to cleanse yourself of all the bad memories from 2011 so you can get a fresh new start in 2012," she said.

Each of the two Cintas trucks brought to the event can shred thousands of pounds of paper in an hour. The remains will be sent to paper mills to be recycled into paper cups, napkins and toilet paper, which is Raimondo's favorite variant.

"It really goes full circle," she said, grinning.