Hutterite colony faces trial in deadly crash

A lawsuit against a Hutterite colony which owned a vehicle involved in a deadly accident will move forward after a federal judge refused to dismiss the case.

Judge Charles Kornmann ruled the colony had a duty to supervise and control its vehicles. The Deerfield Hutterian Brethren Colony near Ipswich had asked Kornmann to dismiss the lawsuit, but Kornmann’s decision sets the stage for a trial later this year.

At issue was whether the colony shared responsibility for a deadly crash that occurred on Feb. 9, 2014. Michael Decker, who brought the lawsuit on behalf of his daughter, Vannah, argued the colony was negligent and reckless by allowing Janos Stahl access to a GMC Jimmy.

Stahl, a member of the Deerfield Colony, used a GMC Jimmy owned by the colony to meet Vannah Decker, who was visiting the nearby Plainview Colony four miles from Deerfield. Stahl, then 17, and Decker, 15, had not met each other in person, but the two had secretly been using their cell phones to message each other for a year.

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Stahl consumed two beers that he took from his grandmother’s refrigerator on his way to meet Decker, who was at a home with other teenagers. After arriving at the home, he drank more beer before he and Decker left in the GMC Jimmy on their way back to the Deerfield Colony on a gravel road. In an effort to impress Decker, Stahl reached a speed of 97 mph before losing control. The vehicle hit a ditch and rolled several times. Decker was ejected from the vehicle.

After regaining consciousness, Stahl walked back to the Deerfield colony in his socks. The temperature at the time was 15 degrees below zero. He showered and went to sleep without reporting the accident. Decker’s body was recovered at the scene the next morning.

Stahl was later charged with manslaughter and served a year in the Edmunds County Jail.

The residents on the Deerfield Colony are prohibited from owning any real or personal property, Kornmann wrote. The colony argued that Stahl was expressly prohibited from operating the vehicle on public roads outside of the colony.

But testimony from Stahl and others in the colony found that young, unlicensed boys routinely operated vehicles both inside the colony and outside on public roads.

“Like most boys on the colony, Janos taught himself to drive by driving vehicles owned by Deerfield Colony without a driver’s license or permit beginning at the age of 12,” Kornmann wrote. “When Janos taught himself to drive, he was not required to ask for permission or ask for the keys to any particular vehicle, as the keys were always readily available to him.”

Kornmann also found that alcohol was easily available to juveniles on the colony and that it was “foreseeable” that colony members could use communal property in a way that could injure others.

“Specifically, it is foreseeable that unlicensed boys with access to vehicles may cause injury to another person,” he wrote. “The foreseeability of injury increases when the keys are readily accessible and alcohol readily available.”