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Family, friends remember crash victim
Nov. 19, 2007
JESSICA HANSEN
When David Loring was a child, his mother worried his fearlessness would be his downfall.
So, when the family lived in a second-story apartment, she put bars on the windows to keep her running, racing risk-taker from falling out a window.
His life grew into a stream of emergency room visits and surgeries, as his hyperactive drive led him into one misadventure after another.
The night he died, pinned under a car that a friend crashed, it was a shock, but not necessarily a surprise.
"When we found out, (his brother) Nic said, 'Mom, you knew we wouldn't be able to keep him forever.' I knew it was true," Lisa Loring, 40, of Kenosha said.
Loring and her sons - Nic, 19, and Jack, 14 - gathered Sunday to celebrate David's life with friends and family at the Polish Legion of American Veterans hall, 4902 Seventh Ave.
David, 17, died Nov. 3 on 60th Street (Highway K) in Bristol.
Matthew Sellers, 18, of Kenosha, said he felt intoxicated but drove anyway, according to court records.
Passengers in his Honda Civic that night said Sellers was driving too fast. They begged him to slow down before he spun out of control and rolled the car twice.
At least two other passengers were seriously hurt.
Sellers broke his neck in the crash, but lived; surgeons fused his spine and put him in a neck brace before he was taken to the Kenosha County Jail, where he is staying while lawyers sort out his felony case.
Lisa Loring considered Sellers a "reckless" driver and said she had refused to let her son even sit in a vehicle with him.
Despite that, anger does not cloud her voice when she talks about Sellers, who was one of David's good friends and lived with the Lorings at one point.
"This ain't a bad kid," she said of Sellers.
Loring describes Sellers as a "straight-A kid at the military academy" whose family problems and personal demons led to drinking.
It's actually a tale not so different from David's.
As a child, David was tossed between special education and gifted student classes.
He was bright. But, his mom said, "He didn't know how to behave at school."
After eighth grade, Loring took David out of the Kenosha Unified School District. He started high school online, through a Web-based charter system.
David was near graduation and expected to take final tests at Gateway Technical College to get his high school diploma.
Loring was watching her brash boy turn into a man - a man she thought had settled down after a near-fatal alcohol overdose in December 2006.
"He had an alcohol problem," Loring said. "He did."
Loring does not drink; memories of alcoholic relatives turned her from the taste. But it was strong in David.
For 18 months he drank, including some after his overdose. It would be OK, he rationalized, if he just had beer.
Loring watched him carefully. She doesn't allow alcohol in her home and wouldn't let David get his license.
But you can't watch every second, as she sadly learned.
The night David died, Loring said she was out for the evening for the first time in two years. David's older brother Nic was home until about midnight, when he got a phone call and left - unusual for him, Loring said.
Neither knew that Loring and his friends had gotten vodka earlier in the night.
"They were waiting for the opportunity to not get busted," she said.
Now, people worry about what to say to Loring.
"I tell them, 'Nothing could be as horrible as the moment I found out.' Just like on television, I fell apart. Now, I'm looking for a way to pull myself back up."
She hopes the ascension started Sunday, although she fears the quiet moments to come as life slowly morphs into a new normal.
For now, Loring and her sons are finding solace in their faith Vaisnava, also known as Hari Krishna, a form of Hinduism.
The religious tradition allowed Nic Loring to help prepare his brother's ashes. David's death also prompted an Indian guru to start a 30-day pilgrimage to honor David's soul.
Loring also has talked to each of the boys in the car with David the night he died. And she talked to the deputy who spent 45 minutes with him as he drifted toward death.
"Up until that point, all I had known about was David screaming," Loring said. "(Deputy Dan McCann) gave me the part where he was able to comfort David and gave me his last words. He said, 'I'm tired now. I'm going to sleep.'
"It sounds painful for a lot of people, but that's my comfort," Loring said. "...I think he came to terms with it and accepted it."
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David Loring, 17, killed in crash, three others severely injured
Sunday, 04 November 2007
Article Author: Ashleigh Barry, CBS58 News TEN@10:00
Speed and Alcohol Factors in Fatal Weekend Crash
TOWN OF SALEM -- The mother of a Kenosha teenager who was killed in a weekend crash speaks exclusively to CBS 58. Lisa Loring's son, 17-year-old David Loring died at the scene after he was pinned by the 1995 Honda Civic shortly after 1:00 a.m. Loring was one of five teenagers in the vehicle.
It happened in the 22100 block of Highway K in the Town of Salem early Saturday morning. Investigators say speed and alcohol were contributing factors in the crash. The teens apparently had been drinking at one of their homes and decided to go for a ride before dropping off one of them at a residence.
Police have identified the driver as Matthew Sellers, 18. He is expected to be charged with homicide by intoxicated use of a motor vehicle as well as three counts of causing injury by intoxicated use of a motor vehicle.
Sellers and the three other passengers were taken to local hospitals, where one remained as of Saturday afternoon. The others, including Sellers, later were transferred to Froedtert Hospital in Wauwatosa for further treatment, said Smith.
The other passengers were Tyler Kraus, 15, Jeffery Gray, 17, and Anthony Wirtz, 19, all of Kenosha. Alcohol and speed contributed to the accident, Smith said.
"I have come to peace with Matthew," says Loring "he loved David, how could I not reach out to him, how could I not forgive him?" she said. All of the surviving victims suffered critical injuries, Sellers broke his neck.
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