Rock-Throwing Suspects Took Memento From Fatal Crash, Cops Say
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Three teenagers accused of hurling huge rocks at passing cars and killing a 20-year-old woman last week allegedly took a photo of the crash scene as a memento.
That’s according to an affidavit from the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office cited by The Denver Post on Thursday. The suspects—Joseph Koenig, Nicholas “Mitch” Karol-Chik, and Zachary Kwak, all aged 18—face charges of first-degree murder with extreme indifference for the alleged rock-throwing spree last week.
Alexa Bartell’s vehicle was the last one to be hit on a road outside of Denver by what police described as a “large landscaping” rock on April 19. She was speaking to a friend on the phone at the time of the incident, police said, and her friend was the one who discovered her body.
“Alexa’s friend tracked her phone and drove to the location on Indiana St. She found Alexa fatally wounded inside her car, which was off the roadway in a field,” the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office said at the time.
One of the suspects told police he felt a “hint of guilt” over the deadly rock-throwing, according to the Post, telling investigators that he and one other man had spent at least 10 other days since February throwing rocks at passing cars.
It remains unclear which suspect allegedly threw the rock that killed Bartell; Koenig has reportedly refused to talk to investigators, while the other two tried to pass the blame.
One of the suspects told investigators the group had wanted to inspect the damage they’d caused afterwards, all three of them stopping so that Kwak could snap a photo.
They then met up the next day to “get their stories straight,” the affidavit notes.
Kwak is said to have claimed that the two others “were talking about them now being ‘blood brothers’” and that they could never talk about the incident.
A makeshift memorial has been set up for Bartell near the site where she was killed.
“She was a very powerful person. And all we have are her memories, and I will cherish those to the day I pass,” Bartell’s friend Samantha Motisi told local outlet KMGH.
“She was a very big personality. Everybody loved her.”
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