A Brownstown woman was arrested after police determined she had driven excessive speeds just prior to a September car accident in Seymour that killed a 16-year-old passenger.
Kylee Edwards, 18, was charged with reckless homicide, a Level 5 felony, and reckless driving, a Class A misdemeanor.
According to the probable cause affidavit, on Sept. 23, officers from the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department responded to the 12000 block of County Road 700N in response to a report of a wreck involving one car at 10:10 p.m.
It had been lightly raining that night, and the pavement was wet, police said.
Police said they were advised the vehicle had flipped over and there were three individuals trapped inside.
While assisting other first responders with extracting the passengers, police said they found one to be unresponsive, a male who was pronounced dead at the scene by Jackson County Deputy Coroner Michael Hogg.
Police said they smelled marijuana coming from the vehicle at the scene, prompting them to search the vehicle with probable cause.
Though no marijuana was found in the vehicle during the search, a small amount was discovered in the pants pockets of the deceased male, according to police.
All surviving occupants were transferred to Schneck Medical Center in Seymour to receive treatment for injuries sustained in the crash. Police then traveled to the hospital to attempt an interview with each passenger as well as Edwards, who was identified as the driver.
The first passenger, a 16-year-old female, told police she did not recall what had happened and was in too much pain to speak with them, officers said.
The second passenger, a 14-year-old female, had sustained severe injuries in the crash and was unable to speak to law enforcement, police said they were told by a family member at the hospital.
That family member went on to explain to officers that she had spoken with the passenger soon after arriving at the hospital, at which point the relative was told Edwards continuously increased the speed of the vehicle, even after others in the car asked her to slow down. She said eventually, the car hit a hill in the road, hydroplaned and then fishtailed before she lost memory of the incident, according to the affidavit.
The final passenger, a 15-year-old male, told police they were moving a little too fast in the vehicle and lost control coming over a hill before the wreck, police said.
Edwards was later interviewed by officers, and police said she told them someone in the vehicle had asked her how fast the car could go, to which she responded she believed it could travel as fast as 120 mph, but she refused to drive that quickly.
Police wrote in the affidavit that Edwards told them she believed she was driving at 80 to 85 mph at the time of the crash, though the posted speed limit in the area was only 40 mph.
Edwards told police she attempted to slow down after going past a hill in the roadway but was unable to do so.
Afterwards, she said the next thing she knew, the vehicle began flipping, and she believed it wound up flipping over multiple times before the crash concluded, police said.
She told police in addition to the wet roadways, her tires were bald with little tread remaining and needed to be replaced.
Edwards also denied having used marijuana herself that night, though she did tell police that some of the passengers had been smoking it, officers said.
Edwards was arrested Monday and booked into the Jackson County Jail in Brownstown. She posted a bond of $2,000 and was released Wednesday.