White Settlement man charged in deadly drunk driving crash kills himself week before trial
WHITE SETTLEMENT, Texas - A man accused of crashing into a White Settlement home while driving drunk and killing an 18-year-old was supposed to go to trial next week. Instead, authorities say he took his own life.
It's a shock to the victim’s family who’ve waited for two years for justice for the 2022 death of 18-year-old Katey Kirkland.
Suspect Donald Gruber died from what appears to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to the White Settlement Police Department.
Police say Gruber drove a truck through the Kirklands’ home in White Settlement, killing an 18-year-old who was in her bedroom, and seriously hurt her dad.
Amy Kirkland was preparing for a trial next week for her daughter’s death.
"We’ve been trying to mentally prepare for this, and I don’t know how to mentally prepare for something like that," she said.
However, there will be no trial because Gruber took his own life on Saturday, August 31.
"I don’t know if I don’t feel closure or if it doesn’t matter," Amy said.
The mother recalls her reaction when the Tarrant County District Attorney’s Office notified her on Wednesday.
"I was just crying. I couldn’t tell you why, I don’t know why I was crying," she said. "Right now, I’m still very…. I don’t know how I feel about it."
On one hand, Gruber escaped facing potential consequences in a courtroom and prison. On the other hand, Amy does not have to relive pain while inside a courtroom.
"I don’t have to go through the trial, and I don’t have to look at photographs and listen to the play-by-play of that night anymore," she said. "But I do kind of feel like that was taken from me."
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A civil lawsuit was filed by the family of Katey Kirkland against the two drivers and The Point on Lake Worth, the bar where they were drinking prior to the crash.
Amy is a teacher at Saginaw High, where Katey went to school. Katey was an only child who had less than a year before graduation.
"She was starting to realize it’s closer than you think," Amy said. "She was just thinking about where she was going to go to school."
For Katey’s case, the intoxication manslaughter charge against Gruber will be dismissed because of his suicide death, according to White Settlement police.
The Kirklands lived down the street from Gruber. Amy saw him the night before the crash.
"And we just said a neighborly hi. We didn’t know him," she recalled.
Now, Amy can only wonder how she would have reacted had she seen him again while on trial.
"Didn’t really know how I was going to react to seeing him," she said. "Am I just going to cry? Am I just going to sit stone-faced?"
Amy says her husband spent about seven months in a coma following the accident. Since then, he has been doing well on his road to physical recovery.