illustration: idris salaam
Last year on August 30th, Cory Kennedy crashed a car he was driving, injuring the one backseat passenger and killing the front seat passenger, Preston “P-Stone” Maigetter, the beloved Thrasher filmer. Countless memorials and gatherings for P-Stone were held following the accident, and as the anniversary of his death approached, more remembrances were popping up every day on social media.
Questions and speculation about Kennedy’s situation and succeeding legal case have been floating around the usual skate gossip channels, but it wasn’t clear exactly which charges he was facing and what kind of sentencing the court was handing down. So to clarify his situation, we looked up his court documents and summarized all the pertinent info below.
When responders arrived at the accident they found several empty beer cans in the car, and a blood test showed Kennedy’s blood alcohol level was approximately 0.10% at the time of the crash, above the legal limit of 0.08%. Tests also confirmed the presence of weed in his system.
After being arrested and released on a $75,000 bail, Kennedy was later charged with the four following counts:
– vehicular homicide
– vehicular assault
– DUI (driving under the influence)
– reckless driving
Kennedy pled guilty to all four counts, and according to a Seattle news outlet, today he was sentenced to serve four years in prison, and after being released he will serve one year on house arrest.
The publicly available documents also contained 30 letters from Kennedy’s friends, family members, and others close to him, all recommending that his sentence be reduced. Each letter is filled with personal stories to demonstrate Kennedy’s good character, and all of them are touching.
“He lost a best friend and permanently changed the course of his own life forever.”
Tony Vitello, President of Thrasher, called Kennedy “a shining light of positive energy in the skateboarding world,” and described how before the accident, Kennedy had been renting out his house on Vashon Island, WA to Maigetter and his family at a discount in order to help the Maigetters relocate from Sweden. Sam Smyth at Crailtap reminisced on his years traveling with Kennedy and Maigetter, and said, “save Preston’s family, no one was more destroyed than Cory. He lost a best friend and permanently changed the course of his own life forever.”
Kennedy’s older sister detailed his efforts to improve himself by undergoing behavioral therapy, assessing himself for alcoholism, and attending Moms Against Drunk Driving meetings. She also said Kennedy ended up giving his house to Maigetter’s wife and two young sons. “Cory, in the face of losing his career, gave them everything he had worked for in the hopes it would provide them any solace.” And while some may have noticed Kennedy is no longer listed on Nike SB’s team page, Kennedy’s sister confirmed in her letter that “he is losing his contract with NIKE.”
But perhaps the most moving letter came from Maigetter’s mother. In it, she wrote about Preston and Kennedy’s close friendship, and advocated on her son’s behalf that Kennedy not serve any prison time. “Preston would have wanted that his friend and colleague, Cory, never be imprisoned for his actions but, as an alternative, for Cory to take responsibility and to give back to the community.”
As cheesy as it sounds, us skateboarders are known for our ability to recover from so many injuries and downturns, so we’ll have to see how Kennedy’s situation turns out. But if you ever needed a reminder to not drink and drive, here it is.
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September 2, 2018 3:05 pm
And before you self righteous jump, yes I have had a family member killed in an auto accident. Was the other driver drunk, no they weren’t paying attention. I’ll take my chances with a .10 than a dumb bitch on their I-phone any day.
September 4, 2018 6:12 am
Should you have to choose?
0.10 is a bit beyond the point where your judgement and your ability to react is impaired. And 0.40 or 0.50? Many people would die with that much alcohol in their system.
Many European countries have set the legal limit to 0.02 and some to 0.05.
September 2, 2018 6:44 pm
Last summer and this one as well have been gnarly on so many levels in skateboarding. 2017 I completed a small make shift park on an abandoned brick patio at the home I grew up in and reside again. At 32 I tried and failed to get flowed again as a man am. I went buck wild both skating and contacting the entire industry all over America. I ended up staying a few weeks in a nervous hospital from dehydration from skating and general nervous collapse from the entire endeavor.(2018 has been far greater on and off the board). I walked into the hospital with my Reynolds 3 emericas still on worn through.
An anecdote on how this all ties in:
I sent a direct email with some footage,pictures,and a small plea to help and older thrasher (33 now) get flowed.It had a patriotic home townie vibe as well.
Literally a day after I sent it I found out he had passed. I went into overdrive due to confusion and shock of proximity to the email. I will always look up to him as a man and skater who always found a way to get r done on all levels. If any of his family or friends saw my material feel free to send some feed back, my deepest condolences. Again, it’s still a shock at the exact timing of the event and my own hopes and dreams in the mix. THRASH!
Pstone Script
Danielle I ♥️you, sorry to hear of Pinky It’s passing. She fought the valiant fight!
107.3 WAAF, the only station the really rocks!
BAM: Smoke weed instead dummy!
September 3, 2018 12:44 pm
get a job dude
September 14, 2018 7:28 am
I know he’s a can short of a six-pack, but that was mean, Yuck.
May 14, 2019 11:42 am
well, i think your sensitivity award for 2018 may have been in jeopardy. you literally just conflated the tragic death of a skateboarding legend to your pathetic failed attempt to get sponsored in your mid 30s, as if there was some spiritual connection of timing – and then asked his grieving loved ones to have a look at your footage if they could pause their tears and give you some feedback. please, kill yourself rando fuckwad.
September 3, 2018 1:11 pm
Stay strong Cory
September 3, 2018 1:21 pm
Skateboarding and skateboarding industry are two distinct things but both of them are really connected. All along the history of skateboarding the relationship between those two distinct things have changed. Sometimes there are really close than sometimes they get farther apart then something new brings them back closer and so on and so on. To me is quite obvious that both skateboarding and skateboarding industry, part of a skateboarding culture led this culture to a more interesting and higher place when they are closer together. By closer I don’t mean the industry giving more money to skaters or supporting more skateboarders. By closer I mean when the values of the industry are closer to the values of skateboarders and are closer to the values of skateboarding. It’s unrealistic to dream of a world that the skateboarding industry’s values are the same as the skateboarders or as the skateboarding but it’s very possible (as skateboarding history as showed us) that that distance can be really closer. Nowadays i feel like the gap is quite big. Even though millions are being spend by the industry to make it look that the distance is not that big. And “make it look like” is really important in this last sentence. Unfortunately some skateboarding industry really tries to MAKE IT LOOK CLOSER instead of really MAKING IT CLOSER. I have some doubts about some other skateboarding companies dropping a skater in this conditions – but that is nothing more than a mere speculation of mine.Nevertheless I really think if skateboarders – who are in reality the base and the reason why a skateboarding industry existed – were a bit more demanding on companies that want to be part of the skateboarding world we would be better off. Again, by saying more demanding I am mean for those companies to share more of the values of skateboarding. It is quite obvious in this case (and i don’t think there is any skater who believes that this was an accident and that for sure P-Stone would not want this accident to be a tool for “cleaning up” skateboarding and making it look more “responsible – in that limited bourgeois’ point of view”. All his videos are hymns precisely against that. This is also a speculation but i doubt that any skateboarder would blame Cory or give a heavy sentence like he has got. Sharing values in this case is realising that the act of drinking and skateboarding lots of times come hand and hand, (and off course I am not saying that the industry should advocate drinking and driving) but it should stay on the boat and help its skater going trough bad times instead of dropping him off to save face to the non-skateboarding world. This just proves that the crazyness and non conformed behaviour of the skaters are only tolerated by these companies, not because they actually understand or support it, but because it sells and when the shit hits the fan and they have to make a choice these companies choose the non skateboarding world. EVEN THOUGH I HAVE NEVER MET YOU, AND EVEN THOUGH YOU WERE RIDING FOR THE SWOOSH! ALL THE BEST FOR YOU CORY! I hope the skateboarding community will stand behind you!
September 3, 2018 4:58 pm
* ” and i don’t think there is any skater who believes that this was an accident” replace by – “and i don’t think there is any skater who believes that this was not an accident” – sorry