Distracted Georgia Teen Driver Faces 9 Charges After Fatally Hitting 2 Women and a Newborn
A Georgia teen accused of fatally hitting three people, including an infant, as they crossed a street, will go to trial after a judge ruled against several defense motions.
Zoe Reardon, 18, has been charged with nine misdemeanors, including second-degree vehicular homicide and distracted driving, for the 2017 deaths of Kathy Deming, 61, Kaitlin Hunt, 28, and Kaitlin’s nearly 4-month-old daughter, Riley Hunt, WSBTV, Fox5 and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution report.
On Sept. 9, 2017, Reardon, who was 17 at the time, was allegedly driving through downtown Woodstock when she struck Deming and Hunt, who was holding her infant child, as they crossed a street on their way to a free concert, the outlets report. All three died of their injuries.
Hunt lived in Florida with her husband and high school sweetheart, Brandon, and their daughter Riley. When they learned they were in the path of Hurricane Irma, Kaitlin decided to take Riley to Woodstock, where her parents live, according to the AJC.
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They arrived at their family’s home on Sept. 9 and decided to go out to a concert that was part of the city’s summer concert series. Deming, who was a mom of two, and Hunt were friends, WSBTV reports.
Reardon’s defense attorneys had filed several motions, arguing that the state needed to be more specific when they accused the teen of being distracted, the station reports.
“One can be distracted in a myriad of ways and the defense needs specificity about what the state is alleging so it can provide a viable defense; otherwise the state can offer alternative theories and ‘see what sticks,’” her attorneys wrote in a motion obtained by the Journal-Constitution.
The defense also attempted to sever the charge accusing Reardon of texting and driving, arguing in the motion that the charge “plays to the fears of every parent, driver and potential juror — a 17-year-old teenager texting while driving that ends up killing someone in an accident,” according to the paper.
In a 2018 interview with WSBTV, Reardon’s lawyers argued that the accident was unavoidable.
“No crosswalk and these people happen to be crossing, and she happened to be driving, and it’s just tragic,” attorney Manny Arora told the outlet at the time. Arora said that Reardon had cooperated with investigators and even turned over her phone, which showed that the last text message the teen had sent was nearly three minutes before the accident.
Reardon told the station she prayed for the victims’ families.
“I never saw anyone coming,” Reardon told the station in 2018. “I wasn’t texting. I wasn’t doing anything, just looking at the road. My eyes were on the road.”
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On Tuesday, a judge denied all the defense’s motions and confirmed that after more than a year of delays, the trial would begin on March 11, the AJC reports.
The news was bittersweet for Kaitlin’s family, her mother, Kathleen Vandiver, told the paper.
The family had sought to move the trial date because Kaitlin’s pregnant sister was expecting her first child that week, according to the paper. However, the judge denied their request.
“Our life’s on hold,” Vandiver told the AJC. “So now, what do we do? They’re making us choose one daughter over another daughter.”
Arora could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
Prosecutors declined to comment on the case.
