Editors note: This is an archived article from March 12, 2012
The operator of a boat that struck another vessel on Lake Murray and killed two of its passengers in May 2010 was convicted of reckless homicide and will serve 10 years in prison.
Steven Kranendonk, 26, of Irmo apologized to the families of Kelli Bullard of Lexington and Amber Golden of Huntsville, Ala., before Judge G. Thomas Cooper Jr., sentenced him to 10 years on each of two counts of reckless homicide, the maximum penalty, and then ordered the sentences served concurrently.
Prosecutors originally charged Kranendonk with homicide by intoxication, but dropped those charges without explanation in favor of the reckless homicide charges that carry a lesser sentence.
Bullard and Golden, who were 25 and 24 at the time, were on a cruise on Lake Murray with their boyfriends when the crash occurred on the night of May 1 near Susie Ebert and Flotilla Islands. Kranendonk admitted drinking alcoholic beverages earlier, and according to court documents, his blood-alcohol level five hours after the crash was measured at 0.11, well above the level of 0.08 that is considered legally impaired in the operation of a vehicle in South Carolina.
Ray Lewis, an investigator with the S.C. Department of Natural Resources, testified that the boat Bullard and Golden were riding on with their boyfriends was “barely recognizable as a boat” after the crash.
“The whole left side of that boat is completely folded in,” he told the jury of five men and seven women.
Before the criminal trial, Kranendonk’s family paid the Bullard and Golden families more than $245,000 each in settlements. Kranendonk admitted no liability in those settlements.
The crash in which Bullard and Golden were killed was the first of two fatal late-night boating collisions on Lake Murray that night. Two other people were also killed in the second crash, making it one of the deadliest days ever on the lake.
In the second crash, Steven Miller of Irmo faces charges of homicide while under the influence of alcohol and marijuana in the deaths of Matthew Howk of Columbia and Randall Carter of Irmo. Miller was operating a boat that collided with another driven by David Porth of the Gilbert area, who was charged with boating under the influence.
Because of the boating deaths, the Lake Murray Association plans to launch a new safety campaign this spring with signs at marinas and landings urging boaters to slow down, stay sober and obey the rules of navigation.
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