Teen receives $600 fine and 80 hours for illegal trash dumping

Toni Lubbers, County Solid Waste Management District Director, seemed to want a harsher penalty for the two trash dumping incidents that Brandon Huckelby admitted to, but appreciated the apology the 17-year-old offered today at Dubois County Trash Court.

Those two incidents involved dumping about sixty bags of trash on a rural county road near the Pike County line in June and July of this past summer. Lubbers responded to the dumps and cleaned them up personally and during the cleanup determined the trash belonged to Kimberly Gray.

Lubbers explained to the commissioners that during the investigation Dubois County Sheriff’s Department Detective Tom Kleinhelter determined that Kimberly Gray was the also known as Kimberly Arthur. She was suspected in both large trash dumps, but Huckelby admitted both incidents that Kimberly was suspected in during an interview by the detective.

The Commissioners were set to hear about the second illegal trash dumping at 9:30 Monday morning but Huckelby’s admission of guilt precluded the necessity of a second hearing.

For those offenses the teen could have faced stiff penalties of up to $1500 in fines and numerous community services hours. Sardonically, Commissioner Larry Vollmer stated maybe they should assign Huckelby to stand on the side of the road with a sign explaining his offenses. He cited a similar penalty handed down by a judge in case involving a motorist passing stopped school buses illegally, but in the end the commissioners decided to award the teen a total of $600 in fines and 80 community service hours for two separate incidents.

Huckelby was ordered to report to the Dubois County Community Corrections to complete the service hours within thirty days.