Accident reconstruction expert weighs in on Holly Springs crash that killed teen

HOLLY SPRINGS, N.C. (WTVD) -- It's been more than a week since the fatal crash that left 14-year-old Max Dunham dead after he was hit while riding his bicycle.

The Holly Springs High School freshman was riding his bike on Avent Ferry Road near Holly Meadow Road in Holly Springs just after 1:30 a.m. on October 26 when he was hit and killed by a car.

That evening, police arrested 16-year-old Ashton Rahlfs for DWI and other charges. Meanwhile, 19-year-old Brandon Russell suffered significant injuries after he and Rahlfs were involved in a head-on collision after Dunham was hit.

"There's two drivers involved in an accident. (Police) need to, number one, place them behind the wheel definitively and then determine which vehicle hit the pedestrian. And that's done probably through paint transfer or DNA evidence deposited on the car that was hit," said accident reconstructionist expert Anthony Racioppo with East Coast Forensics.

Racioppo has more than 35 years of experience reconstructing accidents and more than 25 years working with the New York Police Department.

"Being a retired detective myself," said Racioppo, "You pretty much have an idea of what happened usually within an hour or two of of arriving at the scene. It's just a matter of what you can prove. And you'd also want to be certain."

In an October 31 message to the community, Holly Springs police said their investigation was "complex in nature" and could take several weeks while investigators work to reconstruct the events of that evening before any additional charges would come.

"You don't want to charge somebody and have the wrong guy," said Racioppo.

Monday, friends and family gathered at Apex Funeral Home for a visitation for Dunham. Less than three months prior, Dunham and other loved ones gathered at that same funeral home to pay their respects to his mother, Amy Dunham, who lost a battle to cancer in August.

"I imagine both drivers didn't leave the scene. So there's no real reason to rush to an arrest," said Racioppo of the pacing of the police department's investigation. "You got to weigh it. You don't want to rush to judgment and then have the wrong guy or have some evidence reveal itself that proves that it's not the guy you grabbed. That's more frustrating to the family."