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Mother Charged In Fatal Drunk Driving Crash

March 1, 2006, 05:01 PM EST
Reported by Penny Moore

A Hilliard mother is charged with a drunk driving accident that killed her own little girl, but the mother hasn't been arrested because she admitted herself to a psychiatric hospital.

Abigail Volpe was 6-years-old when she was thrown from the truck her mother was driving Friday night.

The mother didn't have a driver's license, but according to one witness, she did have a drink.

It is a perfect match; the raw wood still jammed into the front of the pickup truck and the gouged out tree with part of the headlight still imbedded.

Six-year-old Abigail Volpe lost her life along Bethel Road and Riverside Drive. Callers reported the erratic driver of the truck.

"She's swerving all over the road. She's going left of center, right of center. She's running red lights; she's drinking in the car," says one driver.

The driver was Abigail's mother, 40-year-old Kelly Volpe.

Caller: Oh, my god. She just went off the road.
Dispatcher: Did she wreck?
Caller: No. She's back on the road

One driver followed the truck for nearly 20 minutes before the crash, all the time reporting its route to the operator.

Dispatcher: We haven't dispatched an officer because we don't have one available in that area. It's Friday night; we're busy.
Caller: I was just concerned because there's a little girl in the front seat.

That driver would have been even more concerned had she known about Volpe's criminal past. Her husband says it is filled with drugs and alcohol and court records show a long list of drunk driving and driving under suspension convictions.

Her husband told 10TV he would take the plates of cars so she wouldn't drive. She got the truck started Friday night even though he says he had the keys.

When she slammed into the tree, 6-year-old Abigail didn't have a chance; she was in the front seat with no belt on.

The Childs father says she was on life support just long enough to donate her organs.

Louis Volpe says he has spent years trying to get his wife off drugs and alcohol. She's been in treatment centers, in jail and even in prison. He didn't divorce her because Abigail loved her mother.

He says he has lost everything, but it is Abigail who has paid the ultimate price for her mother's addictions.

[Admin]

Mother had previous DUIs

Woman charged in accident that killed daughter

By Theodore Decker
The Columbus Dispatch
Wednesday, March 1, 2006 2:35 AM

A Franklin County mother charged with the death of her 6-year-old daughter in a crash last week has a history of driving under the influence, police and court records show.
Perry Township police charged Kelly Volpe, 40, yesterday with aggravated vehicular homicide, operating a motor vehicle while under the influence of alcohol or drugs, driving with her license suspended and various traffic citations in connection with Friday night's crash on Riverside Drive.

Police said Volpe, of 7777 Feder Rd. in Prairie Township, and her daughter, Abigail, were not wearing seat belts. Abigail was thrown out the passenger side door of the pickup truck.

Officers found her without a pulse on the ground beside the truck. She died Saturday at Children's Hospital.

Perry Township Police Chief Robert Oppenheimer said Volpe was found trapped in the truck with a head injury.

Asked by the first police officers to arrive if anyone was with her, she replied, "No, I'm by myself," Oppenheimer said.

Volpe was treated at Riverside Methodist Hospital, where she refused a blood-alcohol test, police said. She has been released from there and admitted herself to Ohio State University Harding Hospital, police said.

Reports show that Columbus police dispatchers were the first to be notified that Volpe was driving erratically at W. Lane Avenue and Kenny Road at 7:28 p.m. Police received a call that she had crashed 20 minutes later.

A motorist behind Volpe, identified in police reports as Karen Marsh, told police that the truck was weaving in and out of traffic on Bethel Road and forcing cars off the road before it turned south on Riverside Drive.

Volpe then crossed the center line, veered back into her lane and drove off the road into trees near McCoy Road, the report said.

Marsh said last night that she was too distraught to discuss the accident.

Oppenheimer said his officers are sorting through Volpe's arrest record, which he said dates to the 1980s.

Franklin County Municipal Court records show that Volpe has at least four prior convictions in the county for operating a motor vehicle while under the influence.

In 2004, she pleaded no contest to driving while her license was suspended and was sentenced to 90 days in jail. In that case, the arresting officer noted in documents, "suspect also has multiple other suspensions."

County court records show that Volpe pleaded guilty in 1989, 1994 and 2001 to charges relating to the possession or use of forged drug prescriptions.

Most recently, she pleaded guilty to a felony forgery charge on Feb. 10 and was to be sentenced on March 29.

Volpe is married to Louis Volpe Jr. He could not be reached for comment yesterday. Abigail was the couple's only child, according to police and birth records.

At the Columbus Preparatory Academy on the West Side, where Abigail was a kindergartner, grief counselors helped students and staff. A power outage closed the school Monday, so many students found out about the 6-year-old's death yesterday.

"It's a tough concept for kindergartners," said Carleigh Stein, one of four kindergarten teachers there.

"They were obviously very sad about their good friend," said another teacher, who remembered Abigail as "energetic and bright" with a love for friends and animals, especially a pet dog named Jack that she spoke of often.

"I want people to know what a wonderful little girl she was," the teacher said.

Dispatch reporters Bruce Cadwallader and Matthew Marx contributed to this story.

[deb]

So very sorry for the father of little Abigail. I pray you can learn who received her organs as this can help you heal. God Bless You.

[Admin]

Girl buried; police ask ‘Why?’
Mom had long record of varied offenses

Saturday, March 04, 2006
Theodore Decker
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Kelly Volpe, 40, left, is charged with aggravated vehicular homicide in the death of her daughter Abigail, 6.

Since the crash that killed 6-year-old Abigail Volpe last week, Perry Township Police Chief Robert Oppenheimer has looked at her mother’s arrest record with anger and disbelief.

Dating to the 1980s, it includes at least six drunken-driving convictions, repeated license suspensions, convictions for forging drug prescriptions and a host of other traffic offenses.

A week after the Feb. 24 wreck, Oppenheimer said he and his officers continue to sort out Kelly Volpe’s string of court appearances and convictions. He has found paperwork for six drunken-driving convictions; he thinks there are eight.

When Volpe crashed shortly before 8 that night, her license was suspended.

"I guess my question is, what is she even doing behind the wheel?" he said. "Nothing’s worked for her, and look what happened: She killed somebody.

"Somewhere along the line, you have to bang ’em so hard they’re not going to do it."

Volpe’s husband apparently had tried to stop her from driving.

The pickup truck she was driving the night their daughter died had no license plate on it. Oppenheimer said Louis Volpe Jr. told police he was in the habit of removing the plate from the truck he used for his plumbing business and hiding the keys from his wife.

"He thought that would discourage her from driving," Oppenheimer said.

Police found no keys for the truck at the crash site on Riverside Drive near McCoy Road.

The ignition had been damaged, though it wasn’t clear whether that was from the crash or from Mrs. Volpe starting the truck without a key, he said.

Abigail, a kindergartner at Columbus Preparatory Academy, was buried yesterday.

Her father has been unavailable for comment. Last night, there was no one at their home on Feder Road in Prairie Township. A child’s toy riding car sat in the driveway of the upscale brick house.

Mrs. Volpe, 40, is charged with aggravated vehicular homicide, operating a vehicle under the influence, driving under suspension and more.

She remained yesterday in Ohio State University Harding Hospital, where she admitted herself after her release from Riverside Methodist Hospital after the wreck.

Volpe has been in and out of treatment for alcohol and drug problems since at least 1988, records show.

She was sent to residential alcohol treatment in 1995 after her fourth drunken-driving conviction in Franklin County Municipal Court and ordered into treatment again in 2000, after her sixth. In most cases, it appears her jail stays varied from 10 to 45 days.

She also has three convictions relating to the possession and forging of drug prescriptions, which brought a sixmonth sentence in 2001. Later this month, she is scheduled to be sentenced on a felony charge of forgery.

Ohio state Rep. Larry Wolpert said the crash strengthened his resolve to push a pending bill into law. Wolpert’s bill would increase sentences for certain repeat drunken drivers who kill someone, putting them in prison for 10 to 15 years. The aggravated vehicular homicide charge that Volpe now faces carries a sentence of two to eight years.

"We’ve got to get them off the streets," said Wolpert, a Republican from Hilliard.

Tilde Bricker, of Mothers Against Drunk Driving Ohio, said her group would like harsher penalties for people who drive drunk with children in the car.

"We regard it as child abuse," she said.

Franklin County Municipal Judge Anne Taylor, who sentenced Volpe on a drunkendriving conviction in 1998, said she can’t recall the specifics of that case.

Records show that Volpe was sentenced to six months by Taylor but ordered to serve just 12 days. The rest of the time was suspended for two years of probation.

"It’s hard to know what approach works for a particular individual," Taylor said. "All of us who deal with this issue see the combination of disease and irresponsible conduct."

Paul H. Coleman, president of Maryhaven, a drug and alcohol-rehabilitation center, said, "It’s a combination of what the health-care community can do and what the justice community can do."

Taylor said she wonders what Volpe is thinking now.

"No matter what any judge does to punish her now, it will never take away the fact that her baby is dead as the result of her conduct."

Yesterday, Abigail’s small casket sat next to pink and purple balloons at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church in Upper Arlington.

"It’s really broken our hearts to see a little innocent thing die," Oppenheimer said.

Dispatch staff writer Alayna DeMartini contributed to this report.

[Admin]

Mom convicted of manslaughter
Drunken driving killed her daughter, jury says

Saturday, October 21, 2006
Bruce Cadwallader
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Her trial had reached the third day before Kelly J. Volpe, whose repeated drunken driving eventually led to the death of her 6-year-old daughter, showed any emotion.

Volpe, 41, was listening to detailed testimony about Abigail Volpe’s injuries Thursday when she asked to be excused from the courtroom. After the jury was led out, she was taken to a nearby jail cell, where she vomited.

Defense attorney G. Gary Tyack said he then decided not to put Volpe through any more testimony. He rested his case in Franklin County Common Pleas Court without calling a witness.

Yesterday, jurors took less than an hour to convict Volpe of aggravated vehicular homicide and driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs.

The Prairie Township woman sat stone-faced again, clutching a worn photograph of Abigail and listening to the verdicts. She faces up to 15 1 /2 years in prison when Common Pleas Judge Angela White sentences her on Thursday.

She also faces a lawsuit — a wrongful-death action filed by her husband, Louis Volpe, Abigail’s father.

Prosecutors said Mrs. Volpe’s case was the first time they had used a new repeat-offender law, which increased the maximum sentence for someone with five or more drunkendriving convictions. Volpe has had eight in the past 20 years.

Tyack, in his closing arguments, told jurors, "There is nobody in this courtroom hurting more than Kelly Volpe.

"She knows she killed her daughter, and that’s something she’ll have to live with for the rest of her life," he said.

Tyack had argued that prosecutors failed to show that Volpe was drunk or on anti-anxiety pills when she crashed her husband’s work truck into a tree about 8 p.m. Feb. 24 on Riverside Drive near McCoy Road. Abigail was thrown from the truck.

Three police cruisers and motor ists who had called 911 were behind the truck when it wrecked. Tyack said police should have been quicker to find and stop her.

"I got there five seconds after it happened," Columbus Police Sgt. Steve Tarini testified. "We had trouble finding her" on Northwest Side streets.

Assistant County Prosecutors Dan Cable and Keith McGrath argued that police rarely catch drunken drivers with the bottle in their hands. Witnesses said they saw her driving the truck erratically with a young girl beside her.

After the crash, Volpe admitted to having drunk some red wine, prosecutors said. Perry Township police reported finding two empty beer bottles on the floor of the truck and a bottle of sedatives with pills missing in her purse.

A toxicologist confirmed that the sedative, a generic version of Xanax, greatly impairs a driver when it is mixed with alcohol.

Volpe refused to take a Breathalyzer test to measure blood alcohol. A test on blood drawn from her at Riverside Methodist Hospital was ruled inadmissible because the hospital didn’t have a newly required certificate to test blood for law enforcement.

She was treated for a cut on her head and a broken ankle and ribs.

"It’s a tough case, because a 6-year-old is dead and her mother caused it," Cable told jurors. "When you do what she did and put your 6-year-old in the truck with you, you don’t lose a child, you betray a child."

Volpe was driving without a license in a truck with no ignition key and broken seatbelts.

Paramedics were able to restore Abigail’s pulse and breathing en route to Children’s Hospital, but the girl died the next day.

[Admin]

Mom gets 20 years for crash that killed daughter
By Bruce Cadwallader
The Columbus Dispatch
Thursday, October 26, 2006

TOM DODGE | DISPATCH
Kelly Volpe during her trial last week

Kelly J. Volpe, a repeatedly impaired driver, received the maximum sentence of 20 ½ years in prison this morning for the death of her 6-year-old daughter.

Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Angela White said Abigail G. Volpe might have forgiven her mother for driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs, but the law won't. Volpe has eight prior convictions for drunken driving, prosecutors said.

Last week, jurors took less than an hour to convict Volpe of aggravated vehicular homicide and driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs.

On Feb. 24, Volpe crashed her husband's pickup into a tree on Riverside Drive. Abigail was ejected. She died the next day after becoming an organ donor.

“It was your job to protect Abigail and instead Abigail needed protection from you,” White said. “You took your daughter on a journey she never returned from. I can't forgive you.”

The sentence consists of 10 years for aggravated vehicular homicide, 30 months for operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol or drugs, and eight years for violations of the state's repeat-offender statutes.

Testimony in Volpe's jury trial showed she may have had beer and sedatives before driving that day, although defense attorney G. Gary Tyack argued that no alcohol was detected in an initial blood test. That test was not admissible at the trial.

Volpe refused to take a breath test after the crash.