A spring break beach trip to Florida for three Columbia friends culminated in a knife and baseball bat attack at an ocean-side resort that left two of the men dead and a third critically injured with 17 stab wounds, Florida authorities reported yesterday.
The victims -- all graduates of Oakland Mills High School -- had gone to New Smyrna Beach as part of a nine-day trip when the deadly fight broke out Thursday night with four other men.
Police reported some of the stabbing victims were also clubbed with baseball bats.
"It was devastating. ... It was a total massacre," said James Tack, manager of the Ocean Palms Beach Club where the assaults happened.
The bodies were found near a pool deck at the time-share resort and on a nearby street, where one of the victims had run before collapsing.
Police believe the violence occurred about three hours after a fistfight between the Maryland men and a group of young Florida residents. When the Florida group returned, they were armed with knives and aluminum baseball bats, said New Smyrna Police Chief Denver Fleming.
"They were out to settle a score," Fleming said.
Killed were Kavens Bradshaw Hall II, 23, and Matthew Christopher Wichita, 21.
The injured man was identified as 21-year-old Seth Kenyon Qubeck, whose mother rushed to Daytona Beach, where he was in intensive care at Halifax Medical Center last night.
The three men lived in a two-story townhouse in Columbia near Howard Community College, where Hall had been a student.
Four people who live in or near New Smyrna Beach, a small island 15 miles south of Daytona Beach and an easy drive to the nearby night life, were arrested after the incident and charges were pending, according to police.
The original fight appeared to have been over a girl and a ring, Fleming said. Police were called to the 18-unit time share about 5: 20 p.m. to break up the brawl, which the chief described as "a routine fistfight."
"The [Florida] boys didn't win that particular argument," Fleming said. "Unfortunately, it didn't end there."
Blows were struck first near a beach and the scene quickly became "a running fight," he said.
Fleming said police were tracking down leads and other suspects and expected to charge more people in the deaths.
"It's a terrible tragedy for our community," Fleming said. "We encourage family activities in our communities.
"It's more family oriented. We just have quiet family restaurants and quiet neighborhoods."
Police identified the local men who were arrested as Neil Ryan Kirkland, 20, and Daniel Stephan Osborne, 19, both of Edgewater; and Jonathan Trull, 27, and Joshua Trull, 17, of New Smyrna Beach.
Jay Smallzman, Qubeck's stepfather, said from the front steps of his Columbia home last night that Qubeck's chances of survival are good, but he will be hospitalized for at least two weeks.
Qubeck, who works at Sgt. Pepper's Restaurant on Lake Kittamaqundi in Columbia's Town Center, has been considering joining the Navy or the Air Force, Smallzman said.
"It's a shock," Smallzman said. "You expect to hear about kids in Florida on spring break getting into trouble but not like this. You see violence every day but when it hits home, there's denial."
Friends gather to mourn
Yesterday afternoon, friends and neighbors said the men who died in Florida were "good kids" who would pick up their friends' children from baby sitters and let youngsters in their neighborhood on High Beam Terrace play with their two pit bull puppies and Rottweiler.
A friend, Jen Stewart, 20, who attended high school with the men and traveled south with them in a cramped car April 9, said she missed her friends.
"They were excited about going," Stewart said. "Kavens loved Florida."
The living room of the men's apartment has beer bottles stacked on shelves and a flag of reggae king Bob Marley adorning a wall.
A large pet snake bathes in the warmth of a heat lamp in Wichita's basement room, and a pink stuffed pig sits in the corner atop a stereo speaker.
Wichita had been working at Dick's Sporting Goods in Columbia, where the store's apparel manager, Richelle Baggesen, remembered him as someone who "gave whatever it took."
"He was great, always really happy," Baggesen said.
Dawn Lawhorn, a neighbor in High Beam, said Wichita would pick up her two baby daughters from baby sitters. He would help her carry groceries and worked hard, she said.
The three had a taste for social life and parties -- which sometimes led them into a skirmish.
"I'm guessing this was not the first fight they had been in," said Oakland Mills High School Principal Marshall Peterson, who has had that position for two years. "That was a real rowdy class they were in."
But Wichita's girlfriend, Jennifer T. Tiemeyer, said she couldn't believe that.
"I thought they were lying," said Tiemeyer, 19, her voice shaky last night. "That's not Matt. He's a great guy. Very loving, very generous. He was the love of my life."
