I found this story pretty disgusting.
http://www.jsonline.com/news/ozwash/aug05/351815.asp
Beer-can memorial a slap in the face
Posted: Aug. 29, 2005
Mike Nichols
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Five people died on Highway 33 in the Town of Trenton last week because a bunch of kids, a couple only 16 years old, went out drinking, rocketed into the back of another car, veered wildly over a center line and killed not just themselves but an elderly couple on the way home from a medical appointment.
And how do their friends remember them?
By going to the scene of the crash and - as part of some sort of perverse tribute to the deceased - drinking some more.
Along with the flowers, candles, a cross and some Led Zeppelin cassette tapes left at a memorial formed along the side of the highway by Monday morning were two cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon.
"This ones for you, Bitchatanen," was written in black marker on one of the empty cans. "Always remember you."
On another Pabst can left nearby was a more succinct and oddly blithe message. "See ya later Mike!" Signed, "Tom."
Written amid all sorts of other messages on a sheet of cardboard nearby, in the meantime, was a quote attributed to "Ozzy."
"Live hard. Party Hard. Party to the death."
And never mind, I guess, who you take with you.
The driver of the Ford Taurus that careened violently out of control, Timothy Beck, was 16 years old and had a blood-alcohol level of 0.16 - twice what the state considers evidence of intoxication, even for someone able to drink legally.
Maybe forgiveness will come quicker because youth and misjudgment, even the idiotic variety, are often companions. Plus, the boy is among those gone and leaves behind a grieving family that told a reporter at this paper Monday afternoon that they'd warned their son about drinking and driving.
But for any number of others also left behind, friends of some of these kids, to fail, even now, to recognize what investigators say helped cause five deaths is, in the words of Ronald Kabitzke, "sick."
A daily reminder
Kabitzke didn't just know Karl and Lavera Bretschneider. He is married to their daughter, Kathleen.
The accident happened Thursday evening and, because they live in Newburg, the Kabitzkes had already driven past the scene probably eight times by Sunday morning. On their way to breakfast and church in West Bend, they drove by it again, said Ronald, at 6:45 a.m.
On both sides of the road, he said, were beer bottles and cans that appeared to have been left behind since the accident. Perhaps four Coors bottles were on the north side, he said, while a handful of Budweiser cans were on the south.
"It just blew us apart," he said.
"These kids," he said, "are celebrating by drinking and doing the very same thing that took all (those) lives."
Jakki Unertl, a 17-year-old friend of Beck's, said Monday that she was one of the kids who left a beer can there.
"I left a High Life can for Timmy," she said.
Unertl said she didn't drink her beer at the scene of the accident, but conceded that others had - and responded angrily when I asked her if she saw anything wrong with that.
"You guys make it seem like Timmy was completely trashed, couldn't even walk," she said.
Speeding, she contended, "was a factor, not the alcohol."
She is wrong, according to the Washington County Sheriff's Department.
Sheriff Brian Rahn, who said last week that the boys and men in the Taurus were drinking at Tendick Nature Park's disc golf course in the Town of Saukville before the crash, identified the beer cans found at the scene of the accident as "Classic."
I found plenty of cans labeled "Classic Lager" at Tendick when I was there Friday morning: Classic cans in the trash at tee No. 2, Classic cans in the trash at tee No. 5, Classic cans in the trash on tee No. 17, Classic cans crushed and left on the ground on tee No. 18.
Now their friends are leaving cans where they died.
"This was their way of showing their respect for their friends," said Kabitzke. "Oh, my gosh."
Today, the Kabitzkes and the Bretschneiders' other relatives will hold a visitation and funeral for Karl and Lavera. Tomorrow, they bury them.
"We have been through a lot with this," Kabitzke said, and the kids drinking at the crash scene "have made it worse."
"Nobody gives a damn about (Kathleen's) parents; it is all about the kids."
Lots of folks drank irresponsibly when they were underage. Lots of folks also learned from it. The sheriff wonders if kids don't get the message now, how they ever will.
"If they think that is OK," Rahn said, "I think they are headed down the same road their friends headed down."
Over at West Bend East, where Beck went to school, grief counselors have been available for any kids who might need them.
Fine.
But Ronald Kabitzke has a better idea.
"I told my wife," Kabitzke said, "I want to go to the school principal and (tell her to) get rid of the grief counselors and bring in the alcohol counselors."
From the Aug. 30, 2005, editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
http://www.jsonline.com/news/ozwash/aug05/351815.asp
Beer-can memorial a slap in the face
Posted: Aug. 29, 2005
Mike Nichols
E-MAIL | ARCHIVE
Five people died on Highway 33 in the Town of Trenton last week because a bunch of kids, a couple only 16 years old, went out drinking, rocketed into the back of another car, veered wildly over a center line and killed not just themselves but an elderly couple on the way home from a medical appointment.
And how do their friends remember them?
By going to the scene of the crash and - as part of some sort of perverse tribute to the deceased - drinking some more.
Along with the flowers, candles, a cross and some Led Zeppelin cassette tapes left at a memorial formed along the side of the highway by Monday morning were two cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon.
"This ones for you, Bitchatanen," was written in black marker on one of the empty cans. "Always remember you."
On another Pabst can left nearby was a more succinct and oddly blithe message. "See ya later Mike!" Signed, "Tom."
Written amid all sorts of other messages on a sheet of cardboard nearby, in the meantime, was a quote attributed to "Ozzy."
"Live hard. Party Hard. Party to the death."
And never mind, I guess, who you take with you.
The driver of the Ford Taurus that careened violently out of control, Timothy Beck, was 16 years old and had a blood-alcohol level of 0.16 - twice what the state considers evidence of intoxication, even for someone able to drink legally.
Maybe forgiveness will come quicker because youth and misjudgment, even the idiotic variety, are often companions. Plus, the boy is among those gone and leaves behind a grieving family that told a reporter at this paper Monday afternoon that they'd warned their son about drinking and driving.
But for any number of others also left behind, friends of some of these kids, to fail, even now, to recognize what investigators say helped cause five deaths is, in the words of Ronald Kabitzke, "sick."
A daily reminder
Kabitzke didn't just know Karl and Lavera Bretschneider. He is married to their daughter, Kathleen.
The accident happened Thursday evening and, because they live in Newburg, the Kabitzkes had already driven past the scene probably eight times by Sunday morning. On their way to breakfast and church in West Bend, they drove by it again, said Ronald, at 6:45 a.m.
On both sides of the road, he said, were beer bottles and cans that appeared to have been left behind since the accident. Perhaps four Coors bottles were on the north side, he said, while a handful of Budweiser cans were on the south.
"It just blew us apart," he said.
"These kids," he said, "are celebrating by drinking and doing the very same thing that took all (those) lives."
Jakki Unertl, a 17-year-old friend of Beck's, said Monday that she was one of the kids who left a beer can there.
"I left a High Life can for Timmy," she said.
Unertl said she didn't drink her beer at the scene of the accident, but conceded that others had - and responded angrily when I asked her if she saw anything wrong with that.
"You guys make it seem like Timmy was completely trashed, couldn't even walk," she said.
Speeding, she contended, "was a factor, not the alcohol."
She is wrong, according to the Washington County Sheriff's Department.
Sheriff Brian Rahn, who said last week that the boys and men in the Taurus were drinking at Tendick Nature Park's disc golf course in the Town of Saukville before the crash, identified the beer cans found at the scene of the accident as "Classic."
I found plenty of cans labeled "Classic Lager" at Tendick when I was there Friday morning: Classic cans in the trash at tee No. 2, Classic cans in the trash at tee No. 5, Classic cans in the trash on tee No. 17, Classic cans crushed and left on the ground on tee No. 18.
Now their friends are leaving cans where they died.
"This was their way of showing their respect for their friends," said Kabitzke. "Oh, my gosh."
Today, the Kabitzkes and the Bretschneiders' other relatives will hold a visitation and funeral for Karl and Lavera. Tomorrow, they bury them.
"We have been through a lot with this," Kabitzke said, and the kids drinking at the crash scene "have made it worse."
"Nobody gives a damn about (Kathleen's) parents; it is all about the kids."
Lots of folks drank irresponsibly when they were underage. Lots of folks also learned from it. The sheriff wonders if kids don't get the message now, how they ever will.
"If they think that is OK," Rahn said, "I think they are headed down the same road their friends headed down."
Over at West Bend East, where Beck went to school, grief counselors have been available for any kids who might need them.
Fine.
But Ronald Kabitzke has a better idea.
"I told my wife," Kabitzke said, "I want to go to the school principal and (tell her to) get rid of the grief counselors and bring in the alcohol counselors."
From the Aug. 30, 2005, editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
