When three Lakeside High students died in a Labor Day crash, it was an unimaginable loss.
“At that time, you just couldn’t imagine that this would ever happen again,” said Tracy Queen, co-president of the Parent Teacher Student Association.
But then in February, a fourth student died in another car crash. Less than three weeks later, a fifth student died in a wreck.
Ashley Gaitan, 16. Katie Gaitan, 17. Coral Lorenzo-Rosario, 17. Sophia Lekiachvili, 18. Guillermo Aguas-Bahena, 16.
“It almost feels like we can’t catch a break from it,” said Bella Perez, a senior at Lakeside who was friends with Lekiachvili. “It’s so personal because those are kids who are in my grade at my school, driving on a road that I’ve driven on before, with the same number of kids in the car that I’ve driven with.”
“None of us imagined that we could be where we are right now,” Queen said.
No matter how immense the tragedy, school goes on. Spring break is next week, and prom is after that. Then final exams. Graduation.
But there’s a sense that the Lakeside community in DeKalb County is bracing for what could come next. They had an assembly this week about safe driving. It was timed for before the break, when students will have more freedom — and a greater chance to make a tragic decision behind the wheel.
“We don’t know if something like that will happen again between now and the end of school,” said Kyle Marsh, co-president of the Lakeside High Student Government Association. “Sometimes (people ask me), ‘How do you stop this?’”
A question of choice
So what do you do after the deaths of five students?
The school brought in counselors to meet with students individually and in small groups. The community donated more than $60,000 in at least three fundraisers to help the families. There were memorial services, halftime tributes at sporting events, a dedication made for the yearbook. And now, there’s a focus on teaching about safe driving. The school is starting its own chapter of Students Against Destructive Driving.
The school brought in Mike Lutzenkirchen. He lost his 23-year-old son in a car crash in LaGrange in 2014, and now works to prevent more young drivers from facing a similar fate.
Credit: Miguel Martinez
Credit: Miguel Martinez
On Tuesday, he fed a harsh line about this year’s crashes to a crowd of hundreds of subdued students.
“They weren’t accidents,” he said. “They were decisions that were made.”
Each of the crashes involved an element of unsafe driving, according to authorities: speeding or driving under the influence or driving late at night or not wearing seat belts.
Young drivers, or those ages 15-20, accounted for 8% of all licensed drivers in Georgia in 2021. But they accounted for 10% of all drivers involved in fatal crashes, and 18% of all drivers involved in crashes with serious injuries, according to data from the Georgia Department of Transportation.
There were more than 250 fatal crashes involving young drivers in the state in 2023. So far in 2024, there have been 46. That’s down from the same time last year.
Students were respectful, quiet while Lutzenkirchen spoke. They’re looking for answers, Principal Susan Stoddard said. The assembly aimed to empower them to step up when things could go wrong.
They left the assembly with a lanyard, meant to hang on their rearview mirrors to remind them to take a few seconds before driving to go through the checklist: Is your mind clear? Is your car free of distractions? Is your seat belt on?
“Hopefully this will stick with them,” Stoddard said. “They have the grief, they have the loss, but they’re learning how to navigate their life now, holding that.”
Credit: Miguel Martinez
Credit: Miguel Martinez
Moving forward
Perez was in the crowd in the gym on Tuesday for the assembly. She thought the message was good, but didn’t like the way Lutzenkirchen put it — like the car crash that killed her friend was her friend’s fault.
“I don’t want to think of it as a mistake she made to put her in this situation,” Perez said.
Part of what’s been hard the last few weeks is that there hasn’t been time to remember their lost peers for the people they were, Perez said. They can’t just look at the crashes as lessons.
Credit: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Credit: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
“They were people. They were our friends. They were our classmates,” she said. “It’s really important that we do remember the lives they lived before.”
But when students reflect on the year, Marsh said, it’s not just homecoming and spring break that will stand out to them — it’s the crashes. They feel it when they drive. Marsh throws his phone in the passenger seat now, out of reach. Queen changed her mind about letting her daughter drive herself to take the SAT in Douglasville. Perez avoids highways.
The crashes rocked the school, tied the students and teachers and parents together in a way they couldn’t have foreseen.
“I definitely feel like our school community has come closer,” Perez said. “Nobody knows how to handle a situation like this ... all we can do is be there for each other.”
More coverage: Lakeside High student deaths
- Grief flows for 7 young people killed in metro Atlanta Labor Day crashes
- Gwinnett police: Drivers were racing at more than 100 mph before 5 teens killed
- Update: Driver facing DUI charge after Lakeside High student died in crash
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