Teen sentenced in crash deaths: Youth to serve time in secure confinement

PROVO — Katelyn Gabbitas will never go to a high school dance. Brady Conger missed celebrating his 18th birthday. And the chance for Tasha Brammer and her mom to cry together at a chick flick is gone.

Three lives were cut short in one car accident last August in Springville's Hobble Creek Canyon, leaving deep wounds and broken hearts.

Some healing came Wednesday afternoon when the 16-year-old driver was sentenced to secure confinement — the equivalent of prison for juveniles — where he could potentially stay until he's 21.

The teenager pleaded guilty in February to three counts of manslaughter, a second-degree felony.

Fourth District Juvenile Court Judge Mary Noonan sentenced the boy, then instructed him to take advantage of the opportunities in confinement.

"Do your time in secure (confinement), ... do it honorably and when you're out, and you will be out, you live the rest of your life in honor of those three," Noonan said.

Family members and friends of Gabbitas, Conger and Brammer, who were 16, 17 and 18, respectively, at the time of their deaths, filled the small courtroom, passing each other tissues and wrapping their arms around each other as they wept.

"Our loss is great," said Cindy Gabbitas, Kateyn's mother. "We are a family with broken hearts."

In court, Cindy Gabbitas choked up as she told the judge that because of the teen driver, who the Deseret Morning News is not identifying because he was not certified to stand trial as an adult, they'll never see their daughter graduate from high school, pick a career, get married or name her children.

Katelyn was a girl with a beautiful smile who loved T-bone steaks, decorating the house with craft projects and cruising through sand dunes on four-wheelers with her parents, her mother said.

Katelyn's dad, Mike, said he has a hard time looking at Ford Mustangs — the type of car the teenagers was riding in at the time of the accident.

Police estimate the driver was traveling nearly 85 miles an hour when he lost control on a curve and slammed into a sport-utility vehicle.

The two men in the SUV were not seriously injured.

The Gabbitas family has not been to Hobble Creek Canyon since the accident.