Personal Injury Law

Three Teens Mourned After I-295 Wreck

By Eddie Farah

The teens were celebrating the end of the school year and cutting school.

Nine kids from Ed White High School in Jacksonville got into a 1997 Ford Explorer and headed to the beach Friday morning. Today their family and friends are mourning the death of three and the injury of six others after the SUV rolled several times and crashed on I-295 Friday morning.

15-year-olds Kimber Krebs, and John Kiely, and 17-year-old Dennis Stout were all killed. Three others remain hospitalized in critical condition after they flew out of the rolling car. Only the driver, 15-year-old Brandon Hodges, who was wearing a seat belt, was hospitalized briefly while two others are in fair condition at a local hospital.

It's almost hard to believe, but at a church service Saturday the parents didn't blame the driver. Instead they recognized that all of their children made some bad decisions. Our hearts go out to these parents at their time of grief.

Florida law says that if you have a learners permit you must be with a licensed driver over the age of 21. It's not known if Hodges had a permit, but no one in the car was older than 17. Charges are reportedly pending against the young teen.

Florida has a mandatory seat belt law, but an Explorer with a third seat has belts for seven passengers. Two were reportedly in the back cargo hold.

Unfortunately, teens do not take seat belt use as seriously as adults. Among the 4,540 teenagers killed in a vehicle accident in 2007, 2,502 were unbelted at the time of the crash, according to federal statistics.

'You're irreplaceable to us' said Daniel Taylor, father of Dennis Stout at the church service in urging other young people to buckle up.#

Full post as published by Jacksonville Personal Injury Lawyer on June 07, 2009 (boomark / email).