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‘They will never leave our side’
By Douglas Crowl |
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‘They
will never leave our side’
By Douglas Crowl and Trevor Hughes LONGMONT — Three Longmont High School students died this week in unrelated incidents, leaving students and staff reeling.
Senior Nate Williams, 19, who suffered from spina bifida, died in his sleep Sunday night.
And sophomore Kristen “Krissy” Worthen, 15, committed suicide late Tuesday afternoon.
About 50 students and friends held a candlelight vigil for the three Wednesday evening at Longmont High School.
“We have a school community that has been traumatized by three very tragic losses,” said John Poynton, the spokesman for the St. Vrain Valley School District. “Staff and students are pulling together, supporting each other. And a lot of thoughts and prayers are going to the families.”
Phone messages about the deaths went out to the parents of Longmont High students Wednesday.
The district assigned 15 counselors, intervention specialists, psychologists and social workers to a trauma response team that will talk to kids seeking help, said KG Campanella-Green, a longtime school counselor and coordinator for student assistant service.
At least 100 students filled a room throughout Wednesday to talk to team members and support each other, she said.
The trauma response team will stay in the school throughout the week.
“It was really just a tough emotional time,” Campanella-Green said.
Worthen’s suicide was likely the most traumatic event for students, though they were struggling to come to terms with all the incidents, she said.
At Wednesday night’s vigil, many of the students cried and clung to each other, trying to talk about their memories of Worthen without falling apart.
“It’s not your fault; it’s not your fault,” repeated one girl, over and over, to another of Worthen’s friends. “It’s nobody’s fault.”
Before the vigil began, a small group of Worthen’s friends gathered near a car, listening to “This Is A Call,” a song by the band Thousand Foot Krutch.
Sang vocalist Trevor McNevan: “She’s calling out to you, this is a call; this is a call out, ’cause every time I fall down, I reach out to you, and I’m losing all control now, and my hazard signs are all out, I’m asking you, to show me what this life is all about.” While many of the students at the vigil described themselves as Worthen’s friends, they said they also wanted to remember Williams and Zabler.
“We all should know we are not alone in how we feel,” said Chrissy Tanksley, who said she was a close friend of Worthen. “Think of all the good times. Don’t think about the bad. Let’s remember all the good times. Let’s remember the smiles, their lives. They will never leave our side.”
Kristen Worthen
Kids struggling with depression should ask for help, Worthen’s older sister, Renee Worthen, said in an interview Wednesday.
“Kids need to know that it’s OK to be depressed, and that it will get better,” she said. “And if it doesn’t get better, go see someone.”
She called her sister an “exceptional girl.”
“She was funny and smart, and she had something to give,” Renee Worthen said. Kristen Worthen appeared in the Times-Call recently when she organized a rally to support a homosexual boy who often wears women’s clothing to school.
“She would stand up for anyone who was being put down,” said her father, Doug Worthen.
Her mother, Tammy Worthen, called her Mighty Mouse because she was little in stature but acted 10 feet tall.
“Mighty Mouse, we love you and miss you,” she said. Renee Worthen said her sister’s willingness to stick up for the little person sometimes made her the target of teasing.
Kristen Worthen also suffered emotional dark periods, which Renee Worthen attributed to clinical depression that her sister had recently begun treating with medication. But Renee Worthen said the family believes she was in good spirits this week and can’t explain why the 15-year-old took her life.
Renee Worthen said her sister committed suicide less than an hour before she was to meet with a Boulder County prosecutor Tuesday.
That meeting was about a 29-year-old Longmont man who was arrested April 4 on suspicion of trying to entice Kristen Worthen into his car.
Renee Worthen said she doesn’t believe the suicide was related to the case.
Chad Zabler
Zabler was an accomplished motocross racer and a senior at Longmont High who was to graduate this year.
He had been riding motorcycles for years. He got into motocross for fun with his father and had been racing seriously for six years, said his mother, Denise Zabler.
He qualified for a regional championship last year and raced at the Glen Helen Raceway in California.
On Sunday, he wore number 219 in Sterling while participating in a Rocky Mountain Motocross Association race. During the competition, he crashed and suffered severe head trauma, Denise Zabler said.
Chad Zabler was flown to a Greeley hospital, where he died of complications from the accident, she said.
“We are holding together the best that can be,” she said.
Many of Chad Zabler’s friends visited the Zabler family in Greeley this week, Campanella-Green said.
Other motocross riders and families of riders are posting comments about Chad Zabler on a bulletin board section of the Rocky Mountain Motocross Association Web site, where his parents announced the death of their son.
One entry reads: “Chad was a great young man, and any time I was at a track and Chad was there too, he was doing what he loved and with a big smile.”
Nate Williams
The Daily Times-Call featured Williams and his struggle with spina bifida in May 2005. On Tuesday, the paper ran another story about the 19-year-old after he died in his sleep Sunday.
“My whole life revolved around him,” his mother, Lezlee Leonardi, told the Daily Times-Call this week. “He was my whole life. He was my buddy. I’m getting a lot of phone calls, so it’s nice to know that I’m not the only one who thought he was special. ... He was such a real hero to me.”
Douglas Crowl can be reached at 303-684-5253, or by
e-mail at dcrowl@times-call.com. |
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