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Memorial grows for teenager
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| A memorial set up for Nicholas VanBenschoten, 16, who died Monday night after the car he was driving left Southers Road in Stockport and crashed into this stone pillar. Lance Wheeler/For Hudson-Catskill Newspapers |
A makeshift memorial that includes a baseball cap, Play Station joystick and flowers continues to grow at the site of an accident in Stockport where a 16-year-old Columbiaville youth died late Monday.
Nicholas P. VanBenschoten, who had just got his learners permit less than two weeks before, crashed a 2001 Daewoo into a large stone pillar located at the entrance of a residential driveway around 11:12 p.m.
According to Columbia County Coroner Angelo Nero, the autopsy results for VanBenschoten revealed that the cause of death was a burst heart due to a high speed crash.
Two rear-seat passengers, Allison Shaw of Valatie and Jeff Beaulieu of Stuyvesant Falls, both 17, were hurt in the crash.
Shaw, who was wearing a seat belt, was transported to the Albany Medical Center by the Greenport Rescue Squad in stable condition. Beaulieu, who was not wearing a seat belt, was airlifted to AMC and was reported to be in critical condition.
No updates were given on the other two victims’ conditions Wednesday.
VanBenschoten was wearing his seat belt.
Calling hours and funeral services will be announced by Valenti and Richards Funeral Home in Hudson.
This isn’t the first tragedy to strike VanBenschoten’s family. On Oct. 25, 2007, VanBenschoten’s older half-brother William “Billy” Everetts, Jr. died in an early morning car crash in Kinderhook. Their sibling David Everetts was charged with driving while intoxicated and was sentenced to a term of one to three years in state prison in the case.
—Andrew Amelinckx
Nicholas P. VanBenschoten, who had just got his learners permit less than two weeks before, crashed a 2001 Daewoo into a large stone pillar located at the entrance of a residential driveway around 11:12 p.m.
According to Columbia County Coroner Angelo Nero, the autopsy results for VanBenschoten revealed that the cause of death was a burst heart due to a high speed crash.
Two rear-seat passengers, Allison Shaw of Valatie and Jeff Beaulieu of Stuyvesant Falls, both 17, were hurt in the crash.
Shaw, who was wearing a seat belt, was transported to the Albany Medical Center by the Greenport Rescue Squad in stable condition. Beaulieu, who was not wearing a seat belt, was airlifted to AMC and was reported to be in critical condition.
No updates were given on the other two victims’ conditions Wednesday.
VanBenschoten was wearing his seat belt.
Calling hours and funeral services will be announced by Valenti and Richards Funeral Home in Hudson.
This isn’t the first tragedy to strike VanBenschoten’s family. On Oct. 25, 2007, VanBenschoten’s older half-brother William “Billy” Everetts, Jr. died in an early morning car crash in Kinderhook. Their sibling David Everetts was charged with driving while intoxicated and was sentenced to a term of one to three years in state prison in the case.
—Andrew Amelinckx
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