WEST FORSYTH — New traffic charges have been filed against the 17-year-old driver involved in a single-vehicle wreck that claimed the life of his teenage friend earlier this month in west Forsyth.
According to the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office, Adam Robert Joseph Di Millo faces six new misdemeanor counts, including reckless driving, driving too fast for conditions, failure to maintain lane and a seat belt violation for having an unrestrained passenger in the vehicle.
Rising North Forsyth High senior Paul Louis Castell Jr., also 17, was not wearing a seat belt when the 2011 Dodge Ram pickup truck Di Millo was driving left Kelly Mill Road in a curve at Rockingham Run. Castell was thrown from the vehicle, which struck a telephone pole, and died at the scene.
Di Millo also was cited with two class D license violations, the first for driving between midnight and 6 a.m. and the second for driving with non-family members younger than 21 within the first six months of being licensed.
He was previously charged with first-degree homicide by vehicle, driving under the influence and underage possession/consumption of alcohol.
Robin Regan, a spokesman for the sheriff’s office, said Di Millo turned himself in on the new charges June 9 at the Forsyth County Detention Center and “posted a bond of $4,180 later that day.”
Authorities have said that Di Millo, Castell and three other youth — ages 15, 17 and 18 — had just left a party that involved alcohol and no parental adult supervision when the crash occurred. The three other passengers received minor injuries.
Also facing misdemeanor charges as the crash investigation continues is Jeremiah Luke Funke, 18, who had played host to the party, which reportedly drew about 60 teens while his parents were out of town.
Funke, who is out on bond, has been charged with possession of less than an ounce of marijuana, possession/consumption of alcohol by a minor and maintaining a disorderly house.
Funke isn’t currently facing additional charges, though Regan said the “investigation is still ongoing to determine how alcohol was obtained and how the minors got it in their possession.”