GOSHEN TOWNSHIP, Ohio — The family of 25-year-old Mathew Penny found a way to honor his life Sunday with something near and dear to his heart.
Penny was one of five people killed in a crash in Goshen Township on Sunday, Oct. 6. Ohio State Highway Patrol reported that Penny was driving a Chrysler 300 down State Route 28 when he collided with 43-year-old Dustin McDole, who was driving a Subaru Legacy.
Both drivers were killed, alongside two of Penny's three passengers — 18-year-old Dezmon Jernigan and 19-year-old Chloe Love. Andrea Iery, 42, was in the Subaru and was also killed. Another passenger in Penny's vehicle was transported to UC Medical Center.
On Sunday, Mathew's older brother Michael Penny organized a cruise to drive to the crash site, which also is now the site of a memorial for all five victims. The cruise was assisted by a Goshen police escort.
Around a dozen cars began at the Goshen police station and drove single-file with their hazards on before ending at the crash site at the intersection of Edenton Pleasant Plain Road and State Route 28.
“I'm just trying to go out there, put my brother’s cross in the ground, and pay my respect and move forward,” Michael Penny said.
Mathew and Michael's sister, Crystal Penny, joined her brother in the special procession.
"Just seeing all of this, knowing he had so many friends. It was one of those things I always worried about him growing up," Crystal Penny said.
She described the terrible moment when she was told that her brother had died in the wreck.
“All I can remember from that morning was just me screaming my heart out at the fact. Because again, he was like a twin to me," she said.
The siblings and their friends planted a cross at the memorial site for Mathew, which now sits alongside crosses planted for the other four people who died in the crash.
