illustration: idris salaam
Last year on August 30th, Cory Kennedy crashed a car he was driving, injuring the one backseat passenger and killing the front seat passenger, Preston “P-Stone” Maigetter, the beloved Thrasher filmer. Countless memorials and gatherings for P-Stone were held following the accident, and as the anniversary of his death approached, more remembrances were popping up every day on social media.
Questions and speculation about Kennedy’s situation and succeeding legal case have been floating around the usual skate gossip channels, but it wasn’t clear exactly which charges he was facing and what kind of sentencing the court was handing down. So to clarify his situation, we looked up his court documents and summarized all the pertinent info below.
When responders arrived at the accident they found several empty beer cans in the car, and a blood test showed Kennedy’s blood alcohol level was approximately 0.10% at the time of the crash, above the legal limit of 0.08%. Tests also confirmed the presence of weed in his system.
After being arrested and released on a $75,000 bail, Kennedy was later charged with the four following counts:
– vehicular homicide
– vehicular assault
– DUI (driving under the influence)
– reckless driving
Kennedy pled guilty to all four counts, and according to a Seattle news outlet, today he was sentenced to serve four years in prison, and after being released he will serve one year on house arrest.
The publicly available documents also contained 30 letters from Kennedy’s friends, family members, and others close to him, all recommending that his sentence be reduced. Each letter is filled with personal stories to demonstrate Kennedy’s good character, and all of them are touching.
“He lost a best friend and permanently changed the course of his own life forever.”
Tony Vitello, President of Thrasher, called Kennedy “a shining light of positive energy in the skateboarding world,” and described how before the accident, Kennedy had been renting out his house on Vashon Island, WA to Maigetter and his family at a discount in order to help the Maigetters relocate from Sweden. Sam Smyth at Crailtap reminisced on his years traveling with Kennedy and Maigetter, and said, “save Preston’s family, no one was more destroyed than Cory. He lost a best friend and permanently changed the course of his own life forever.”
Kennedy’s older sister detailed his efforts to improve himself by undergoing behavioral therapy, assessing himself for alcoholism, and attending Moms Against Drunk Driving meetings. She also said Kennedy ended up giving his house to Maigetter’s wife and two young sons. “Cory, in the face of losing his career, gave them everything he had worked for in the hopes it would provide them any solace.” And while some may have noticed Kennedy is no longer listed on Nike SB’s team page, Kennedy’s sister confirmed in her letter that “he is losing his contract with NIKE.”
But perhaps the most moving letter came from Maigetter’s mother. In it, she wrote about Preston and Kennedy’s close friendship, and advocated on her son’s behalf that Kennedy not serve any prison time. “Preston would have wanted that his friend and colleague, Cory, never be imprisoned for his actions but, as an alternative, for Cory to take responsibility and to give back to the community.”
As cheesy as it sounds, us skateboarders are known for our ability to recover from so many injuries and downturns, so we’ll have to see how Kennedy’s situation turns out. But if you ever needed a reminder to not drink and drive, here it is.
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September 2, 2018 11:04 am
Gave his house? Thought he was sued by her for a couple different houses and his entire net worth.
September 2, 2018 11:47 am
Not only did he give her his own house and let the family stay there she then sued him for everything he had. Fuck his dumb ass wife. Dude could barely afford a lawyer. 4 years is the minimum sentence when killing someone in a vehicle and the year of house arrest is total bullshit. This dude will be on probation for 10 years after that. Fuck that dumb bitch
September 2, 2018 12:41 pm
“Yea fuck this woman for wanting the guy that killed her husband to cover the ensuing financial burden.”
September 2, 2018 9:28 pm
Cory’s parents are wealthier than all the skateboarding pros combined. He could afford a lawyer big dawgie. One look at anything this dipshit was doing on social media and in videos for the past 3 years could have told all his “friends” and sponsors that shit was going to go bad. Because he’s good at skateboarding it makes him beyond reproach and approach for his bad behavior. It’s actually encouraged. It’s unfortunate that in seeking his own demise he took someone else’s down with him, including his wife and kids as they will never be the same again. So, not fuck his dumb ass wife, fuck your dumb ass for not having enough of a brain, which is probably soaked in alcohol or high on weed, to realize the situation at hand. Fucking stupid skater.
December 20, 2018 5:06 pm
Agree.
September 2, 2018 12:15 pm
I would like to read an article about how the skate community can promote alcohol and marijuana use, but then hate people like Cory Kennedy and Ali Boulala for their accidents, which happened under the influence of alcohol and marijuana. That seems contradictory to me.
And then you say, this is a reminder to not drink and drive. But alcohol impairs the ability to think and make decisions – like whether or not to drive. So should you condone drinking at all?
September 4, 2018 1:42 pm
Listen to Antwuan Dixons 9 club interview. Companies take charge of peoples personalities and make it for profit. Look at all the nike videos they have a certain character for everyone. Cory and Clark Hassler were the “crazy” “kooky” skaters on nike. I dont see why anyone would wanna be a famous or any kind of online skater nowadays. Also the berrics sucks and the games of skate are fun to watch but did anyone see that versaceplug instagram kid skate? He is blowwwwwwwsss! Everything you see is make believe on the internet.
December 20, 2018 5:07 pm
Psh. Implying Antwuan had more of a personality than being a dumb nigger. You dumb.
September 2, 2018 3:01 pm
Ok this “drunk driving” phrase is driving me fucking insane. .08 or .10 blood alcohol is nothing to someone who regularly drinks. I work in an Emergency room and have seen people with .40 , .50 come in completely shitfaced rude and combative and then completely polite and normal when they got down to a .20. The law just needs to have a magic number because law is not objective. Were there other substances involved? Who’s to say. But these self righteous fucks screaming “oh my god, .10 he was drunk” need to shut the fuck up because they don’t know what they are talking about.
September 8, 2018 3:13 am
TRUTH. Thank you.
October 4, 2018 7:48 pm
Absolutely. DUI hysteria.
What is completely missing from the discussion is Cory’s propensity to speed and drive recklessly. He apparently did that with or without alcohol.
.10 hardly caused Pretson’s death, like all these DUI crusaders want to pretend. It was the extreme speed at which Cory drove his car which caused Preston’s death. But speeding is still a socially acceptable crime, so we’ll just not even mention it.
May 14, 2019 11:24 am
Probably agree with this. You can catch a .10 from 2 beers in a half hour. It really isn’t significant as far as BACs go and in terms of drunkenness. It was priobably more of him acting like a fucking reckless jackass. It’s unfortunate that we had to lose P-Stone because of this dumb motherfucker.
December 20, 2018 5:10 pm
“Were there other substances involved? Who’s to say.”
Yes, weed, confirmed in the fucking article you are commenting under Dr. Dipshit. He killed someone for acting like a nigger, fuck him and fuck you burnouts. P-Stone’s children will be screwed because of this fucking retard.
December 23, 2018 9:33 am
Jenkem, how are you allowing Dickhead comments like this?
January 1, 2019 8:49 am
StimCoCruzer Did you fucked one day by a nigger? Because in every comments you do you talk about that!
Perhaps one day it was a Big Nigger in your ass and you can’t go over at all ?
May 14, 2019 11:27 am
Do us all a favor: get a gun, load it up, and put a bullet in your head and spare us all from your lame personality. The only nigger here is YOU motherfucker.
December 31, 2018 3:19 am
Exactly!