Five-year-old boy who witnessed mother's murder during custody exchange now dead at 18 (Crescent Township, Pennsylvania)

Violence and despair have a way of cascading through the generations. This is a very sad example.

Back in 1998, dad WILLIAM KEITEL shot to death his ex-wife during a custody exchange. Their 5-year-old son was a witness to his mother's senseless murder.

And now that little boy, who grew to be an 18-year-old high school senior, has died after his vehicle collided into a utility pole.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_712521.html

Teen who witnessed mother's slaying killed in car crash

About the writer
Margaret Harding is a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review staff writer and can be reached at 412-380-8519 or via e-mail.

By Margaret Harding
PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Arnold Harper thought his lifelong friends Charles and Janet Walker suffered enough when their daughter was murdered in 1998.

Then he heard their grandson, who witnessed his mother's slaying when he was just 5, died in a car crash on the way to the Walkers' home.

"I thought, 'That can't be possible,' " Harper, 70, of Center said yesterday as he prepared to visit his friends. "When their daughter died, you thought they had their tragedy. I don't know how they can get over it."

Phillip Walker, 18, died Sunday night when his vehicle struck a utility pole on Spring Run Road Extension on his way to his grandparents' Crescent home, Moon police said. The Walkers adopted Phillip Walker and his sister after the children's father fatally shot their mother and her fiance on New Year's Day in 1998.

"That wasn't their grandkid," Harper said. "He was their child."

"It is a tragedy," Moon police Chief Leo McCarthy said. "He's 18 and gone like that. I'm sure it's going to be felt heavily in Moon High School and throughout the communities."

Phillip Walker was a senior at Moon Area High School and looking forward to attending college, Principal Michael Hauser said.

"He was always a kid with a smile and a pleasant hello," Hauser said. "He had the best attitude a kid could have. He never seemed to have an off day."

The school is offering counseling to students and staff, and working on plans to commemorate Phillip Walker. "We are coping under the very difficult circumstances," Hauser said.

Phillip Walker was 5 when he watched his father, William Keitel, shoot and kill his mother, Michele Keitel, 35, and her fiance, Charles Dunkle Jr., 34, during a custody exchange at an Ohio Township convenience store. Keitel shot and wounded Charles Walker during the incident. Keitel is serving life in prison for the crimes.

Charles Walker declined to comment yesterday.

Phillip Walker played soccer for the high school, a sport he loved since he was a child, Hauser said.

"You would never have known he had some difficulty as a youngster," he said.

The Walker home was busy with visitors yesterday evening. Harper stopped by with his wife to drop off food for the family.

"Everybody really, really loved him," Harper said. "It's hard to believe."