Boater killed girl while driving drunk — with 39 empty beer cans found on his boat: DA

A boater killed a 10-year-old girl while driving drunk on a North Carolina lake, according to prosecutors — who said 39 empty cans of beer were found on his boat, including “seven that had been shotgunned.”

Quinten Kight, 40, was drunkenly driving his girlfriend’s boat while pulling tubers on Harris Lake, about 25 miles outside of Raleigh, on Saturday afternoon when he struck swimmers, prosecutors told his first court hearing Monday, according to WRAL.

He killed 10-year-old Brooklyn Caroll and so badly injured school social worker Jennifer Stehle, 41, that she lost a leg, officials said.

“They found 39 empty beer cans in Mr. Kight’s boat, seven of which appear to have been shotgunned,” Chatham County District Attorney Jeff Nieman told Monday’s hearing — saying that another 50 containers of alcohol were found in the water.

It’s not clear how many people were on the boat with Kight at the time.

Officers tried to perform a sobriety test on Kight but “determined that he was unable to follow the instructions,” the DA said, according to the News and Observer.

Authorities said they’re awaiting the results of a blood test conducted after the incident.

Brooklyn, a 5th-grade student at West Lake Elementary School in Apex, died from her injuries after her leg was severed in the crash, officials said. 

Stehle, a social worker at the same school, was airlifted to a hospital where she is reportedly in stable condition.

Kight, 40, faces charges of serious injury by impaired boating, operating a boat in a reckless manner, felony boating while impaired and misdemeanor boating while impaired, according to court documents obtained by the News and Observer.

His charges could be elevated to second-degree murder, the prosecutor said.

His 56-year-old girlfriend, AnneMarie Flanigan — who owns the boat — was arrested Tuesday for allowing him to operate the boat while under the influence. She is facing two felony counts of boating while impaired and one misdemeanor charge of boating while impaired.

Kight’s bond was set at $250,000 and Flanigan’s at $500,000 as of Tuesday afternoon, according to the News and Observer.

Kight was previously convicted for driving under the influence in New Mexico in 2009. He additionally has pending charges for hit-and-run in Moore County, North Carolina from a 2023 incident.