KINGSTON – The driver of the car in which four young men were killed in Saugerties on Wednesday remains in the intensive care unit of Westchester Medical Center and Ulster County District Attorney Holley Carnright expects his investigators to interview her as soon as she has recovered sufficiently. She is unable to communicate, for now.
Meredith McSpirit, 19, was driving a car which crashed 110 feet down a cliff killing all of the passengers in the vehicle.
Killed in Wednesday’s Saugerties crash were Jante Clark, Dante Crump, Adam McQueen and Kaireem Meeks, Jr.
Carnright said it is premature to draw any conclusions as to what happened in the tragic accident.
“She is not in a fatal condition so we are looking to talk to her and we are going to try to get some blood work done and continue the investigation as to what anyone saw at the time,” Carnright said.
McSpirit, who goes by the name Meredith Wood on Facebook, has received many comments from friends wishing her a speedy recovery and expressing their condolences for the deaths of the four men.
The Kingston resident was arrested on August 19 for unlawfully dealing with a child and endangering the welfare of a child, both misdemeanors, according to a New York State Police news release.
Troopers were called to the McSpirit house at 131 Birmstone Hill Road in the Town of Kingston, in response to a 911 call of “unconscious 17-year- old female who appeared to be under the influence of drugs or alcohol and a two month of female child screaming,” police said.
Officers found McSpirit’s younger sister, Sara-Anne, “disoriented and unable to care for herself along with the two-month-old female niece.”
Upon further investigation, troopers determined that Meredith McSpirit had provided and smoked a marijuana cigarette with Sara-Anne prior to exiting the residence, leaving the underage sibling alone to care for said infant.
Appearance tickets were issued to both sisters, for Town of Kingston Court hearing dated August 25th – one day before the fatal car crash.
Earlier, in Nov. 2012, Ms. McSpirit, then age 16, was also arrested for conspiracy and aggravated harassment, both misdemeanors, after she assaulted another teen and then made threats against her on Facebook.
A photograph of McSpirit currently available online comes from her MySpace page, showing her chugging from what appears to be a bottle of alcohol.
Carnright said any previous charges unrelated to the fatal accident would have no bearing on this investigation.
Meanwhile the AP is reporting that state police say a 19-year-old woman driving a car that crashed in the Hudson Valley, killing four passengers, had been charged a week earlier with child endangerment related to smoking marijuana.
Police say Meredith McSpirit of Kingston failed to make a turn Wednesday morning in Saugerties and crashed. Four male passengers died and McSpirit was hospitalized. All had just finished shifts at a local horse show venue.
Police said it's too early to say if the crash was related to human error, criminality or mechanical problems.
A week earlier, troopers say McSpirit left her 2-month-old daughter with her 17-year-old sister after the two young women smoked a marijuana cigarette together. Responding to a 911 call about a baby screaming, state police say they found Sara-Anne McSpirit disoriented.
The women were charged with child endangerment and released for future court appearances.
