
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, May 15, 1993                   TAG: 9305150119
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder/Tribune
DATELINE: FREDERICKSBURG, OHIO                                LENGTH: Medium

AMISH MOURN 5 CHILDREN KILLED BY CAR

Hundreds of Amish traveled on foot and by buggy across the rolling hills of this northern Ohio community Friday to console relatives of five children who were killed when a car plowed into them while they were walking home from a birthday party.

Dozens of family members and friends sat quietly at a picnic table outside the home of David and Ada Kurtz as the body of their 14-year-old daughter, Neva, was carried into their home for visitation.

Also killed were Ruby Troyer, 10; and three children from the same family: Wilma Weaver, 11; Freda Weaver, who would have been 9 Friday; and Ivan Weaver, 2.

Three other children were in serious condition Friday evening at Children's Hospital Medical Center in Akron. Spokeswoman Molly Watson identified the children as Elsie Kurtz, who turned 7 Wednesday; Barbara Troyer, 13; and Susan Troyer, 7.

The accident occurred when the driver of a car was trying to pass another vehicle and lost control. The car crashed through a fence and into 10 children walking along a grassy berm.

The driver, Eric Bache, 18, was being held in the Wayne County Jail.

Six young children had celebrated a birthday party Thursday afternoon at the home of Sarah Swartzentruber. Four of their older siblings came to the house later to escort them home about 4 p.m. The children were walking on the shoulder of the road, facing traffic. Swartzentruber was working in her yard. She looked up at the sound of screeching tires.

"I saw the red car on two wheels," she said. "I saw the red car hit the kids. They just flew like chickens."

Two children were thrown more than 100 feet into a field and one girl's leg was pinned under the car after it flipped upside down.

The children's families, all of whom live nearby, heard the crash and rushed from their homes to comfort the injured and cover the dead with blankets.

"It was so sad I had to turn around and go home," said Marie Miller, who encountered the scene while she was walking to visit a friend. "I couldn't stand to hear the children screaming."

Bache, a drifter whose last known address was in Millersburg, Ohio, was bound over to the grand jury Friday in Wayne County Municipal Court on five counts of vehicular homicide.

After the accident, Sgt. E.A. Stevenson, who interviewed Bache, said he "showed a remarkable lack of remorse for his actions. . . . He never broke down except to hang his head when he found out he would be spending the night in jail."

Keywords:
FATALITY

by CNB