Caleb Petersen works as a student coach at Hyde Park High School after chronic pain from arthritis ended his senior season as quarterback. Petersen had recently agreed to join his brother Colin’s coaching staff at St. Dominic Savio High School before his death May 17.
Courtesy of the Petersen family
By midafternoon on Sunday, May 17, Colin Petersen and his mother had started to worry.
Caleb Petersen, Colin’s 19-year-old brother, hadn’t answered anyone all day. Their parents were out of town in Virginia visiting extended family. Colin and his mother were on the phone, talking through where Caleb might be, when a neighbor’s call came through — Austin police had gone to the family’s house that afternoon and found no one home.
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“We assumed that he was just sleeping in or something, but we were like, he should be awake by now. It’s 3 o’clock,” Colin said. “And that’s when she got the call, and that’s when we found out.”
Caleb had been dead for about 12 hours.
Nearly two months after the crash, the couple who hosted the graduation party Caleb left that night were charged with supplying the alcohol that Austin police say contributed to his death.
Russell Young and Rebecca Young each face a Class A misdemeanor charge of purchasing or furnishing alcohol to a minor, according to arrest-warrant affidavits filed in Austin Municipal Court. A judge found probable cause to support both arrests July 10. It is the most serious charge Texas law allows in a case in which the only person killed was the one who had been drinking — a distinction that has left Caleb’s family arguing the statute is written backward.
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Under Texas law, furnishing alcohol to a minor rises to a felony only if the minor’s intoxication causes serious injury or death to another person. Because Caleb was the only person killed, the case remains a misdemeanor.
“To me that’s insane. That doesn’t make any sense,” Colin said. “So if he would have in the accident happened to kill someone else and himself, the Youngs would be able to be charged with a felony. But because he was the only one who died in the accident, it’s a misdemeanor.”
The Youngs’ charges stem from a May 16 party at the couple’s home on Lakemoore Drive. Witnesses told investigators that more than 150 people attended and that some guests were high school freshmen, according to the affidavits.
Investigators said the Youngs provided a keg that underage guests could freely access. A paid bartender was at the party, but witnesses said teenagers were seen pouring their own drinks from alcohol left unattended.
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According to the couple’s arrest affidavits, witnesses allege the Youngs knew minors were drinking and that no age checks were being conducted. At least one other adult — the mother of one of Caleb’s friends — also told investigators that minors could access the Youngs’ keg without parental supervision.
“There might have been people watching who was drinking the alcohol,” he said, “but they didn’t care who was drinking it.”
Caleb Petersen left the party before crashing his Camaro into the rear corner of an 18-wheeler at about 2:24 a.m. May 17 in the 11400 block of northbound Research Boulevard in Northwest Austin, police said. The collision caused the Camaro to roll and land on its roof.
Caleb was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 3:07 a.m. The truck driver remained at the scene, was not intoxicated and cooperated with investigators, according to police.
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“With the exception of Caleb’s immediate family and loved ones, no one is more saddened over the tragic automobile accident that took his life than Mr. and Ms. Young,” Alan Bennett, lawyer for the Youngs, said. “Caleb was a close and dear friend of their oldest son; he and his family have been and will remain in Mr. and Ms. Young’s thoughts and prayers.”
Colin said the first hours after learning his brother had died were mostly blank.
“Just, you know, empty. There was a hole,” he said. “And then followed by a lot of frustration and confusion, because I didn’t know the whole story yet.”
Once he could steady himself, he started making calls, he said — piecing together the night from people who had been with his brother and “getting answers that I didn’t want to hear.” Each account matched the last. Then the toxicology report came back.
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The affidavits allege that both hosts knew minors were drinking and allowed intoxicated teenagers to leave the property. Investigators also alleged that alcohol Caleb obtained at the party contributed to the crash, though the documents do not provide his blood-alcohol concentration.
At least four witnesses told police that the Youngs had hosted a similar gathering the previous year where alcohol was also accessible to minors without adult supervision, according to the affidavits.
‘He would pour into other people’
Caleb had been attending Austin Community College and was working on transferring to the University of Texas. He was also, as of a few days before the crash, about to become a football coach.
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Caleb Petersen fishes in an undated family photo. Petersen, 19, died May 17 after leaving a graduation party in Northwest Austin.
Courtesy of the Petersen family
Colin, who graduated from college two years ago and was hired as offensive coordinator at St. Dominic Savio High School in Round Rock, had just brought his younger brother on to coach the offense with him.
Caleb played quarterback at Hyde Park High School, a private Christian school, until arthritis at an unusually young age left him with chronic pain and cost him his senior season. His head coach gave him a spot as a student coach instead, and he found something in it.
Caleb was quiet with people who didn’t know him, Colin said, and expansive with people who did. He ran. He fished. Mostly, he golfed — with friends, on courses all over Austin, and with his father and brother, the one thing the three of them did together consistently.
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Colin talked to Caleb’s friends afterward and learned Caleb had frequently helped them through difficult times.
“He was able to put his struggles kind of in the back seat and pour into other people,” Colin said. “It was the individual friendships and relationships, the way he would pour into others and really get them out of dark times, that he’s not going to get to do anymore. And I hope that those people who he did pour into pour into other people the same way that he poured into them.”
The Youngs have not reached out to his family since the accident, Colin said. More than 400 people attended Caleb’s celebration of life.
“I pray that they find God, and that they turn from their actions,” he said of the Youngs. “That would be my message to them.”
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‘A slap on the wrist’
Colin said he considers the charge against the Youngs “a small piece of justice,” but not much more than that.
“Caleb paid the ultimate price for what transpired that night, and the responsible adult in charge is getting a slap on the wrist,” he said. “It almost encourages this type of behavior if the parents know that it’s really not that big of a deal if somebody was to drive home and kill themselves in the process.”
Both brothers attended Hyde Park High School; the party was a graduation celebration for a Hyde Park student. Colin said parents should not assume sending their children to a private Christian high school will shield them from problems.
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Colin said he has since been in contact with administrators at another private school where he previously worked, pushing for the kind of written parent agreement — a signed pledge not to furnish alcohol to students — that he learned some schools already require.
“Parents are there to correct and to model,” he said, “not to try and be cool and hang out with them and make horrible decisions alongside their kids and their kids’ friends.”