Montgomery County high school trainer charged with giving beers to teens before a fatal DUI
Kelsey Martin invited a group of teens to her home in Pottstown last summer, prosecutors said. Hours later, one was dead after a crash.
An athletic trainer at a Pottstown-area high school has been charged with supplying alcohol to former students last summer, one of whom caused a fatal car crash hours later, prosecutors in Montgomery County said Tuesday.
Kelsey Martin, 35, has been charged with six counts of furnishing alcohol to minors. There was no indication she had hired an attorney, and she did not return a request for comment.
Martin befriended Connor Quinn, 19, and his classmates when they were students at Owen J. Roberts High School, according to investigators.
It was unclear if Martin was still employed by the district. Owen J. Roberts’ superintendent, Will Stout, did not return a request for comment Tuesday.
Quinn and two of his former classmates — all of them 18 and recent graduates at the time — drove to Martin’s home in Pottstown after midnight Aug. 10, prosecutors said. They brought along Louis Carbajal, 18, a recent graduate from nearby Spring-Ford High School.
According to the affidavit of probable cause for her arrest, Martin gave the four teens Miller Lights and drank with them on her back porch. One of the teens — whom police did not identify — later told detectives this was the second time that summer he drank with Martin at her home, but the affidavit did not explain the details.
Hours later, as the group was driving back from Martin’s home, Quinn lost control of the Acura sedan he was driving, according to court documents.
Investigators say he sped around a sharp curve too quickly on South Hanover Street in North Coventry Township and slammed into a utility pole. The impact was so powerful, it split the vehicle in half.
Carbajal was ejected from the vehicle and later died at Reading Hospital. Empty beer cans were strewn throughout the inside of the wrecked car, police said.
Quinn’s blood-alcohol content at the time of the crash was .176 percent — more than two times the legal limit, according to court documents.
He was arrested months later and charged with homicide by vehicle while driving under the influence, reckless endangerment, and related offenses. His criminal case is pending in Chester County.