{"id":155139,"date":"2026-04-02T06:36:25","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T06:36:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/155139\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T06:36:25","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T06:36:25","slug":"teen-driver-was-intoxicated-in-crash-that-killed-off-duty-police-officer-in-ohio-officials-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/155139\/","title":{"rendered":"Teen driver was intoxicated in crash that killed off-duty police officer in Ohio, officials say"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A 17-year-old driver was intoxicated when his vehicle rear-ended a golf cart, killing an off-duty police officer last year, authorities in Ohio said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ohioattorneygeneral.gov\/Media\/News-Releases\/March-2026\/Jackson-County-Teen-Charged-in-Crash-That-Killed-O\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" data-absolute=\"true\">Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost said<\/a> in a news release on Tuesday that the 17-year-old boy has been charged with two counts of aggravated vehicular homicide, one count of aggravated vehicular assault, one count of vehicular assault, and two counts of operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol or drugs in Jackson County Juvenile Court.<\/p>\n<p>Officer Matthew Juniper with the Wellston Police Department was killed in the crash on Aug. 30, 2025. Yost said the teen was intoxicated and driving a Hyundai Accent when he rear-ended a golf cart traveling southbound on South Pennsylvania Avenue near the intersection of Sixth Street in Wellston around 2 a.m.<\/p>\n<p>      <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/default-2025-09-01t092522-197.png#.webp\" alt=\"default-2025-09-01t092522-197.png \" height=\"349\" width=\"620\" class=\" lazyload\"  loading=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p>                  Officer Matthew Juniper with the Wellston Police Department was killed in a golf cart crash on Aug. 30, 2025.<\/p>\n<p>                Photo Credit: Wellston Police Department\/Facebook<\/p>\n<p>Juniper was a passenger in the golf cart and was taken to a local hospital, where he died from his injuries. The driver of the golf cart, also a Wellston police officer, was seriously injured in the crash, Yost said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Juniper, who joined the Wellston Police Department in 2021, was remembered as &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/pittsburgh\/news\/ohio-police-officer-killed-golf-cart-crash\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" data-absolute=\"true\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\">truly one of a kind<\/a>.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Matt was truly one of a kind, everything you would want in a police officer and more,&#8221; a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/WellstonOhioPD\/posts\/pfbid02yV4ZS5u5XNQqq3QTCy2ERETQudSwVkqEEhGE5rchJ98EkDBaV8PFjRptCUGbopv4l\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" data-absolute=\"true\">Facebook post<\/a>\u00a0from the department said after his death. &#8220;Compassionate and fair, hard-working and dedicated to his craft, fun to work with and a joy to be around.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The 17-year-old boy reportedly sustained minor injuries.<\/p>\n<p>\n          More from CBS News\n        <\/p>\n<p class=\"content__tags__label\">In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 17-year-old driver was intoxicated when his vehicle rear-ended a golf cart, killing an off-duty police officer last&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155140,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[18837,52618,293,73,75,74],"class_list":{"0":"post-155139","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh","8":"tag-dui","9":"tag-dui-crash","10":"tag-ohio","11":"tag-pittsburgh","12":"tag-pittsburgh-headlines","13":"tag-pittsburgh-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155139\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}