Park Tavern driver gets 30 years for ‘senseless’ crash as survivors question DWI laws

The victims of Steven Frane Bailey had no chance to change their fate.

Before he was sentenced to 30 years in prison Monday in Hennepin County District Court, surveillance video of Bailey driving his car into the patio at Park Tavern in St. Louis Park was shown for the first time.

It proved what had long been said and what Bailey had admitted: The deaths of Kristina Folkerts and Gabriel Harvey and the injuries to several other people on that patio stemmed from an act of selfishness on a late-summer evening during a holiday weekend last year.

The surveillance video showed Bailey drive his car haltingly forward through the lot, back up several feet to park before gently bumping into another car. He then put the car in drive and, seconds later, accelerated abruptly for about 200 feet. He plowed over a thin metal gate and kept driving as tables, chairs, plates and glasses exploded skyward.

The impact killed Folkerts and Harvey, while several other people were left with serious physical injuries.

Family members of Folkerts and Harvey spoke at the sentencing, as did the survivors.

All spoke of the ramifications of that crash. Families forever altered. Bodies left inalterably damaged. Trauma that will last a lifetime.

Aaron Folkerts, Kristina’s husband, said the senseless decision by Bailey led him to an impossible question: “My daughter never gets to hug her mom again; how do I explain that to her?”

He said Monday was the last time he would think of Bailey, “but I do believe he will think about us and every other person affected by this tragedy every day.”

Kristina’s father, Jon Bryant, said the crash has affected his family in ways Kristina would have hated, the tragedy of the loss splintering grandparents from grandchildren.

When Bryant heard that Bailey said after the crash that he didn’t have an alcohol problem, he was floored.

“He has multiple DUIs; the court system failed me for allowing him to ever drive a motor vehicle,” Bryant said in a statement read by a victim advocate. “By allowing him to drive, I have lost my little girl along with constant contact with my grandchildren.”

“We are a dead language, our conversations, our love now forever unspoken,” Flowers said.

Harvey’s father, Craig, said Denzel and his son had built a lovely life together and Harvey was months away from becoming a registered nurse — a moment embraced by the co-workers sitting with him on the patio that night. He said Harvey’s love extended everywhere, for his grandparents and his neighbors.

He said Bailey’s decision to leave home with a blood alcohol level four times the legal limit changed countless lives.

“We are not alone,” Craig Harvey said, pointing out that Bailey, also, had a loving family who were now victims. Bailey’s two daughters and mother, who sat in the courtroom for each hearing, cried gently as Bailey was handcuffed and taken into custody.

Bailey kept his eyes downcast for the bulk of the sentencing but consistently glanced up to watch victims speak about how his actions had harmed others and to watch the video of himself driving through the patio.

She wouldn’t return home for 40 days.

“I was lucky, though,” D’Albani said. “Kristina was not lucky.”

That she was lucky does not make her life easy. Several victims spoke of the dichotomy of grief and gratitude that comes with surviving a nightmare.

They have dealt with skull and pelvis fractures, traumatic brain injuries and hematomas so deep the pain lasted for six months. They have been left as shells of themselves, medicated, trying to resume their lives, their schooling, their relationships. They have been left needing friends and partners to support them in ways they never imagined. They’ve been left trying to make sense of something that will never make sense.

Harvey was at Park Tavern to celebrate the new job of his friend and co-worker Laura Knutsen.

“I am at a loss for how to describe the devastation of losing someone as spectacular as Gabe,” Knutsen said. “I have no words for the grief, only a sense of pain and guilt.”

Judge Juan Hoyos said the victim impact statements were unlike anything he’d experienced in nearly 11 years on the bench.

“I just hope that what you share with us here today will lead to some change in the future that this never, ever happens again,” Hoyos said. “But obviously we can’t guarantee that.”

Earlier this year, the Minnesota House passed more stringent DWI laws for repeat offenders. The bill, sponsored by Rep. Larry Kraft, DFL-St. Louis Park, passed 123-5. It passed 67-0 in the Senate.

Bailey was given the last word at the hearing after pleading guilty to five felonies, including two counts of third-degree murder.

Hoyos agreed.

“I am just at a loss,” Hoyos said, pointing to Bailey’s supportive family, his clear addiction and his lack of willpower to change his life. “All I can think of is at some point you gave up on yourself.”

Bailey was then given the strongest sentence available to the court. After he was taken into custody his family and his victims filed out together.