Driver in ‘06 Fatal Collision Sentenced to 11 Years

GRUNDY, Va. – The word “accident” still sticks in the throat of Jim Goff when he talks about the 2006 vehicle collision that claimed the life of his brother and a Buchanan County supervisor.

The driver at fault, Paul David Kennedy, veered into oncoming traffic, lost control of his gravel truck and slammed head-on into the pickup carrying Robert Frank Goff and Joseph Keene, both supervisors at Jewell Smokeless Coal Corp.

Last week, a Buchanan County judge gave Jim Goff – and surviving family members of both men – a new choice of terms to describe the fatal incident: involuntary manslaughter and reckless driving.

Kennedy, 41, of Pounding Mill, Va., was sentenced to a total of 11 years in prison after pleading guilty to the state’s charges. Buchanan County Circuit Court Judge Patrick Johnson suspended 7½ years of the sentence, contingent on Kennedy’s successful completion of six years of active supervised probation.

Gerald Arrington, the special prosecutor who brought the state’s charges against Kennedy, called his actions “callous,” noting his lack of remorse during the legal proceedings and his subsequent traffic violations after the fatal February 2006 collision.

Court records in Tazewell, Russell and Wythe counties show that Kennedy was convicted of several speeding and vehicle safety violations – all misdemeanors – between 2006 and 2008.

Arrington also argued that Kennedy owed a “higher duty” to the public because he was driving a 70,000-pound vehicle.

Keene was a well-known figure in the coalfields, serving as a chairman and elected member of the Buchanan County Board of Supervisors, as well as on several nonprofit boards.

“Joe Keene will be fondly remembered for his hard work and soft-spoken manner and sorely missed by his loving wife of 33 years, his children, his numerous other family members and friends, and the citizens of Grundy and Buchanan County,” reads a resolution passed by the Virginia General Assembly in March 2006 to commemorate Keene’s life.

Keene’s widow, Vickie, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

For Jim Goff, neither the passage of time nor Kennedy’s convictions ties up the broken ends of family life after his brother’s death.

“This accident, if you can call it that, has ruined our family,” he said Tuesday by phone. “We used to get together for every occasion. Now it’s hard to do that,” he said.

Goff, along with Vickie Keene, advocated legislation that would require anyone involved in a fatal collision to immediately undergo a drug test, he said. Goff was unsure if the initiative had ever been drafted into a bill.

It was never clear whether illegal substances played a role in the 2006 crash.

“People that drive these trucks have a greater responsibility,” Goff said, echoing Arrington’s argument. “If you’ve driven on some of these roads, you know there’s little room for error.”

| (276) 645-2558

Editor’s Note: This article was corrected on May 27, 2009.