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Paula Kathern Kennedy

Age : 58

Gender : Female

Race : White

Date : 10/03/2021

Location : Intersection of Noe Bixby Road and Chatterton Road

City : Blacklick Estates

County : Franklin

State : Ohio

Agency : Madison Township Police Department

Officer(s) :Not Disclosed

Cause of Death : Vehicle

Event : Bystander killed by crash following police response to stolen vehicle

OPEN RECORDS SUMMARY :

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REASON WHY POLICE ENCOUNTER WAS INITIATED:
The events began when a foster parent called 911 concerning a teenage boy in her care. During the incident, the teenager took a vehicle without permission and drove away. Police were responding to the reported vehicle theft when the subsequent driving sequence ended in the fatal crash near Noe Bixby Road and Refugee Road. Later prosecution coverage specifically traced the fatal crash back to the foster parent’s 911 call.
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OPEN RECORDS SUMMARY:
On 10/03/2021, at approximately 8:50 a.m., a vehicle driven by a teenager who had left his foster placement and taken the vehicle without permission crashed head-on into a vehicle driven by 58-year-old Paula Kathren Kennedy near Noe Bixby Road and Refugee Road in southeast Columbus. Federal crash data record the fatal collision on Noe Bixby Road at 8:50 a.m.
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The collision killed Kennedy and seriously injured the teenage driver. The crash was severe and both vehicles sustained extensive damage. The case later resulted in a juvenile vehicular-homicide prosecution, with subsequent reporting examining the sequence beginning with the foster parent’s call to authorities and ending with Kennedy’s death.
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Kennedy was not simply an unidentified motorist caught in the crash. She was a longtime Groveport Madison Schools employee who had spent years working directly with generations of students and families. School records show that Paula Kennedy worked in clerical positions in the district going back at least to 2008; by 2018–2019 she was the cashier in the Groveport Madison High School main office, handling student fees and payments.
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Her death hit the school particularly hard because Kennedy was one of the familiar people students encountered throughout their high-school years. Groveport Madison High School publicly mourned her death as an “absolute tragedy,” and the school community subsequently held a memorial for its longtime secretary.
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Kennedy's connection to the school community continued to be recognized years after her death. In 2024, Groveport Madison Schools posthumously selected Paula Kathren Kennedy for one of the district's alumni/community awards, preserving her name among people recognized for their contributions to the Groveport Madison community.
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The fatal crash therefore ended a relationship between Kennedy and Groveport Madison Schools that had lasted well over a decade. Public employment records place her in clerical work at Groveport Madison High School in 2008 and 2009, at Groveport Madison Junior High School in 2012, and again at the high school in later years.
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DISPOSITION:
The teenage driver survived. In 2022, prosecutors pursued a vehicular-homicide case against him in juvenile court arising from Kennedy's death. Reporting on that prosecution disclosed that he had been in foster care and that the chain of events preceding the fatal collision began with a 911 call from his foster parent.
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No Columbus police officer was criminally charged for an officer’s role in the police response preceding Kennedy’s death.
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OFFICER BACKGROUND:
The officers involved in the police response preceding the fatal crash were not publicly identified.

SOURCE LINKS :

https://www.10tv.com/article/news/local/groveport-madison-hs-remembers-longtime-secretary-who-died-after-crash/530-058ddd68-66c8-4053-9f8b-125c2605562b
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OeVwcYs5lg
https://www.gocruisers.org/our-district/alumni/awards
https://www.gocruisers.org/Downloads/2018-2019%20POS.pdf