'Every Avenue' Being Explored in Fatal Crash, Detective Says

Investigators from the Ocean County Prosecutor's Office are still reconstructing  just what happened during the early morning hours of Feb. 3, when a car driven by a councilman's son slammed into a brick wall at the Pine Beach Elementary School.

The probe began yesterday morning, almost immediately after a tow truck removed the mangled 2011 Hyundai Accent - bundled up in a blue tarp - from the east parking lot of the elementary school on Pennsylvania Avenue.

The driver, Matthew Budesa, 20, Pine Beach; Kimberly Van Gorden, 20, Beachwood; and Matthew Witzgall, 21, Toms River, all died at the scene, said Deputy Chief Detective Michael Mohel of the Ocean County Prosecutor's Office. Budesa, a 2009 graduate of Toms River High School South, was the youngest son of longtime Councilman Robert Budesa and his wife Linda.

Friends of Witzgall were planning a candlight vigil for the three victims at 4 p.m. in Winding River Park in Toms River, according to a Facebook page entitled "R.I.P. Matt Witzgall."

Autopsies conducted on Budesa and Van Gorden last night by the Ocean County Medical Examiner's Office indicated that both died of multiple traumatic injuries. The autopsy on Witzgall is slated for tonight, Mohel said.

Mohel stressed that the autopsy results -which listed the deaths as accidental - are preliminary But it could be weeks before the results of toxicological tests taken are known, he said.

"That's pending further investigation by the Prosecutor's Office and the toxicological tests," Mohel said today. The accident happened sometime between 4:30 a.m., when a borough police officer made a routine check around the school, and 6:48 a.m., when a school employee arriving for work discovered the car and dialed 911, Police Chief John Sgro said yesterday.

Sgro said the car was traveling at a high rate of speed in the early morning darkness when it struck the side of the school head-on and tore out a 6-by-6 foot chunk of brick wall in the school's media center.

Mohel had no comment today when asked how the three had spent the previous night and what they were doing out that early in the morning. He also declined to comment on whether liquor or drugs had been found in the car. The Star-Ledger and Asbury Park Press have reported drugs were found in the car, based on anonymous sources.

Some have questioned how nearby residents missed hearing the impact. But the parking lot is set back from the street. A brick abutment juts out from the right side of the brick wall, shielding the point of impact from the street. The east side of the school is surrounded by woods on the left and a soccer field in the back.

Budesa, Van Gorden and Witzgall were not wearing seat belts. There were no skid marks on Merion Avenue - a roadway that leads straight into the east parking lot - or in the parking lot, Sgro and Mohel have said.

Accident reconstruction examines a number of factors,  Mohel said.

"They look at a lot of physics, engineering, a lot of variables," he said. "Then they make a determination."

Berkeley Patch will continue to provide updates on this story as more information becomes available.