November 17, 2005

By Diane Chiddister

During the space of two hours on Saturday evening on roads in and around Yellow Springs, traffic accidents cut short the lives of three young people.

At about 6:10, 13-year-old Neetahnah Neal was struck by a car on Tecumseh Road about three miles north of Yellow Springs.

The daughter of Beverly Rodgers and an Antioch School graduate, Neetahnah was pronounced dead after she was taken by CareFlight to Dayton Children’s Hospital.

Just after 8 that night, a car driven by Jonathan Coffey, 25, who lived in town for several years as a teenager, crashed into a tree on Corry Street near the Antioch Theater. He and his passenger, Heather Conley, 25, of Fairborn, both died from the crash.

Coffey is the son of Robert and Barbara Coffey, who live on Glen View Road in Yellow Springs.

Photo courtesy of the Antioch School Neetahnah Neal, an Antioch School graduate, was killed while walking on Tecumseh Road on Saturday.

A kind and generous spirit
According to those who knew her, Neetahnah Neal was unusually kind. And for a 13-year-old, she was unusually determined, planning to become a lawyer so she could help her people in the Native American community.

“What made her unique was the spark in her spirit,” Antioch School Older Group teacher Chris Powell said on Monday. “She brought with her to the world a gift of kindness and generosity. She was a good friend, a good listener. She was a comfort to her friends when they needed it and she was silly when they needed that.”

Neetahnah had graduated from the Antioch School last year after studying for two years in the Older Group, and was currently homeschooling at the home she shared north of Yellow Springs with her mother, a professor of anthropology at Antioch College, and her stepfather, Daniel Rodgers. Her father, John Neal, lives in Xenia.

Students, teachers and parents at the Antioch School spent much of Monday talking about Neetahnah and working through their grief, Powell said.

“In the time she was here, she made a huge impact” on the school, Powell said.

Don Wallis, who worked with Neetahnah on her writing at the school, said she “was a very special person here. She brought a presence and a strength that the other children recognized.”

Wallis said Neetahnah had called him on Friday to say how much she enjoyed the independent schooling she was doing at home. She had worked far ahead in her long-distance learning program, he said, and she wanted to go further still. She loved learning, he said, and was especially excited about studying law, so that some day she could help bring justice to Native Americans, especially the Miami Nation in Oklahoma, of which she was a part and where she spent several years.

Last summer, Neetahnah spent several weeks at a workshop at the new Museum of the American Indian, which is part of the Smithsonian Institute, in Washington, D.C. She had been chosen, based on an essay she wrote, to participate in the workshop as one of eight Miami Nation young people from across the country.

A little after 6 on Saturday evening, Neetahnah and two friends from the Antioch School were walking down Tecumseh Road near her home when she was struck by a car. The three children appeared to be “just out walking around,” according to Sergeant Yvonne Thorne of the Ohio State Police, which investigated the accident. “They were being kids,” Thorne said.

According to Thorne, the three were wearing dark clothing and were walking with the traffic. Neetahnah appeared to be walking near the white line on the side of the road, while the other two were walking on the gravel or grass.

The car, which was driven by Julia Cady of Yellow Springs, appeared to have struck Neetahnah because it was dark and Cady couldn’t see the children.

After the accident Cady didn’t realize she had hit a person, Thorne said, but did know something had happened, and she stopped the car and went back to the spot. One of Neetahnah’s friends had called 911 on her cellphone, Thorne said, and CareFlight took the girl to Children’s Hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

The investigation into the accident is ongoing, Thorne said, and it is not clear if charges will be filed against Cady.

In an e-mail message to the Antioch College community on Sunday, Beverly Rodgers wrote that “We are taking Neetahnah home to her Miami people.” The family will have a service in Oklahoma and she will be buried in a Miami cemetery.

A local time of remembrance for Neetahnah will take place on Sunday, Nov. 27. For information about the service, call the Antioch School at 767-7642.

Memorial contributions may be made to the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma, in care of Julie Olds, P.O. Box 1326, Miami, Okla., 74355. The contributions will go toward the Myaamia Project, a Miami language and culture program through the Miami Tribal Library.

A fun-loving young man
An impromptu memorial next to a tree near the Antioch Theater on Corry Street includes a teddy bear, several clusters of roses and a helium balloon that reads “Thinking of You.” The memorial marks the spot where the car Jonathan Coffey was driving crashed into the tree Saturday evening, killing Coffey and his passenger, Heather Conley.

Yellow Springs High School Principal John Gudgel said that during Coffey’s two years at YSHS in the late 1990s he seemed “an easygoing guy, a fun-loving guy who got along with others.”

Coffey played on the high school football team for a year and did not graduate from the school.

On Saturday at around 8, Coffey was driving south on Corry Street near the Community Children’s Center when Yellow Springs police officer Gerry Greene, headed north on Corry, locked into his radar that Coffey was traveling 39 miles per hour in a 25-mile-per-hour zone. Greene turned around, activated his flashing lights and began following Coffey, according to Yellow Springs Police Chief John Grote.

Naomi Orme, who was also driving on Corry Street, said that when the lights on Greene’s cruiser were activated Coffey immediately accelerated to a very high speed and passed her and another car. Orme said she saw Coffey’s car become airborne before it crashed into the tree.

She said the police cruiser was traveling at a normal rate of speed after activating its lights.

According to Sergeant Tony Isom of the Ohio State Police, which investigated the accident, Coffey’s car first went off the left side of the road, then veered right before it hit the tree. The road was covered with gravel due to a resurfacing project.

Conley died on impact from the crash, according to State Patrol investigators, and Coffey was flown by CareFlight to Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton, where he died in the emergency room.

“It’s a terrible tragedy,” Grote said. “My heart goes out to the victims’ families.”

The accident is still under investigation, Isom said.

In a report on its Web site, WDTN quoted Sergeant John Lumpcik of the State Patrol as saying that excessive speed, alcohol use and lack of seat belts appeared to have contributed to the accident. The Web site reported that a local man who saw Coffey moments earlier at the Speedway said Coffey appeared to be intoxicated, although blood alcohol levels had not yet been determined by Tuesday.

Conley lived in Fairborn and was the mother of three young children. She worked as the manager at Subway in Fairborn. In addition to her children, she is survived by her parents, Benton and Vicki Harris, her sister and brother, also of Fairborn, and her maternal grandparents.

Funeral services for Conley will be held Thursday, Nov. 17, at 11 a.m., in the Belton-Stroup Funeral Home in Fairborn, with burial following in Byron Cemetery in Fairborn.

Arrangements for Coffey can be found on the Obituaries page.

Contact: dchiddister@ysnews.com