|
Parents' grief swells as case goes unsolvedBy BILL STEVENS © St. Petersburg Times, published October 26, 1998 "It's been there so long now I'm afraid it's like a tree," Wayne Kettlety said. "People don't notice it anymore." There is a resignation in his voice. His energy is sapped as days pass with little new information. On Nov. 10, it will have been a year since his son Danial was killed by a hit-and-run driver while walking on Ridge Road, and today the sorrow that Wayne and his wife Sheree feel overwhelms any hope that the killer will be identified. For a while, in June, it seemed promising that the mystery might be solved. An informant saw the Kettletys' plea on cable TV and was certain he knew who had been driving the vehicle that struck the 19-year-old triathlete and River Ridge High School graduate. He told authorities that the man had his pickup truck cut up into scrap after it was involved in a hit-and-run accident. When the Florida Highway Patrol interviewed the driver and concluded he was not involved in Kettlety's death, the informant was unimpressed with the trooper's effort and contacted private investigator Mike Holden. Working without pay, Holden got aggressive. He videotaped interviews with the informant, driver and man who cut up the truck. He brought parts of the truck to his office and criticized the Highway Patrol for not running tests to determine whether the parts were linked to the death. Witnesses had reported seeing a small, blue pickup truck stop after Danial was struck about 6 a.m. near Little Road. And though FHP officials criticized Holden as an opportunistic publicity hound, they were embarrassed when the Times reported that the truck driver had been convicted four times of driving drunk. Troopers had failed to perform this simple records check, adding to the Kettletys' suspicion that they had been lackadaisical in trying to solve this mystery. The State Attorney's office got involved because of the publicity, and before long the informant, truck driver and mechanic were brought in for questioning. Troopers picked up the truck parts from Holden's office for testing. Polygraphs were administered, though not to the driver. Finally, last week, officials from both the Highway Patrol and the State Attorney's office concluded that the pickup truck had indeed been involved in an accident, but not the one that killed Danial. "We knew that back in June," Sgt. Don Young said, "but unfortunately we wasted about 80 man-hours going back over everything. The informant drew a conclusion that the truck was involved in the Kettlety case." Young said that troopers found a record of an accident on State Road 52 that seemed to match the one the driver said he had been involved in before deciding to disassemble the truck for scrap parts. Young said the frame of the truck had been bent. He added that there was no evidence from the scene of Kettlety's death that would match with anything from the disassembled truck, though he still hopes to polygraph the truck driver. Meanwhile, he said, there is a new tip that is encouraging. Two weeks ago, the Highway Patrol took a call from somebody who said the hit-and-run vehicle was actually a sedan and that two men dumped it in a lake. "Trooper (Kenneth) Ratcliff spent seven hours just the other day running down information," Young said last week. "Some names were mentioned, and they developed into other names. The source of the tip seems valid." Wayne and Sheree Kettlety, who had complained last summer that troopers did not return calls from people offering information about the case, have been notified about the latest tip. "We're grateful that people haven't forgotten," said Wayne, a mechanical engineer. "Each week we place fresh flowers at the site. We continue to get a lot of support from Danial's friends. But there is lots of pain, much of it from not knowing who did this. * * * If you have information about this case, call the Florida Highway Patrol at (727) 841-4181, or Holden & Associates at (727) 849-1605.
Business |
Citrus |
Commentary |
Entertainment
|
he large sign offering a reward is due for a change.
