A Michigan couple who lost their 18-year-old star-athlete son in a 100-mph crash last year want the driver’s mom to pay after text messages show she was aware of his reckless speeding habit but allowed him to drive her high-performance vehicles.
Kiernan Tague, 17, picked up his friend and neighbor Flynn MacKrell, 18, from his parents’ home in Grosse Pointe, a suburb of Detroit, on Nov.17 while he was home from college over Thanksgiving break, according to the Detroit Free Press.
But just five minutes after picking up Mackrell in a BMW X3 M series, Tague, then 16, lost control of the vehicle while traveling 105 mph in a 25-mph zone and crashed into a post and then a tree — splitting the car in two.
Mackrell, a stand-out freshman swimmer at the University of Dayton, died on impact. Tague was transported to a nearby hospital with serious injuries, but survived.
In March, Tague was charged with second-degree murder and is out on bail awaiting trial in Wayne County.
However, investigators have since unearthed texts indicating Tague‘s mother, Elizabeth Puleo-Tague, was aware of her son’s carelessness behind the wheel and even called him out for his speeding habit in a text message two months before the deadly wreck.
“Slow the f–k down right now!” she allegedly texted her son on Sept. 14 after the GPS tracking app Life360 alerted her that he was traveling at 123 mph in the family’s Audi coupe, according to the Detroit Free Press.
“I have screenshots of you doing 90 mph in the middle of the night when I didn’t even know you had left … And again two weeks ago going 123 mph just because,” another message from the mother to her son read.
She even stressed to her boy that his behavior “scares me to my bone,” according to the outlet.
Nevertheless, weeks after Puleo-Tague called out her son, she bought herself a brand-new BMW, which she gave her son access to despite the car’s ability to reach speeds of 177 mph and his concerning speeding habits.
Mackrell’s parents, Anne Vanker and Thad Mackrell, are seeking to use the messages to show she failed to take reasonable actions to prevent her child from driving despite knowing how reckless he was behind the wheel.
“She was sitting on a ticking time bomb. She knows he’s out of control, yet she basically gets him a weapon,” Vanker told the outlet. “It’s like she handed him an AR-15.”
Vanker said she was unaware of Tague‘s driving habit or home life until after her son was killed and the investigation was launched.
Vanker mentioned that Puleo-Tague also has a 2015 Subaru Forrester but still allowed her son to drive her Audi and then BMW even after warning him about speeding.
Investigators found that the alleged serial reckless driver and his mother had argued over texts about “taking/using his mother’s credit card without permission, being out during overnight hours without permission, and about Kiernan’s extensive reckless driving habits.”
“The messages between the two suggest that Kiernan’s mother has little to no control over Kiernan,” one investigator wrote in a report, according to the Detroit Free Press.
“Kiernan regularly drove recklessly and took/used his mother’s credit cards without permission, despite his mother’s repeated orders not to.”
One text exchange showed that she asked her under-21-year-old son to “pick up a bottle of wine” for her on Oct. 2, 2023, to which he agreed despite being underage.
Strangely, a week after asking for him to pick up booze, she reportedly sent him a screenshot of a website explaining the penalties for having a fake ID.
Two weeks before the fatal crash, a fight between the mother and son broke out at the home over Tague breaking a table — allegedly after she told him he couldn’t use the car, according to the outlet.
Investigators also found a 2020 police report she made alleging her son had “assaulted her and fled the area.”
The alleged out-of-control teen was being picked up at his friend’s house and became angry at his mother, according to the report.
“While in the front seat, Kiernan turned around and began punching his mother (who was in the back seat) and even bit her on her hand.”
Tague was arrested for domestic violence and was sent to the Wayne County youth home for an unknown amount of time, the outlet reported.
“His mother repeatedly told responding officers that she was afraid of Kiernan,” an investigator writes in a report.
The teen’s most recent police contact before the crash was on Aug. 30, 2023, after law enforcement was called to the Tague house “because he was yelling and throwing items within the house because his mother refused to get him an American Express Gold Card.”
With the MacKrell family now aware of Tague’s history and his mother’s messages acknowledging her son’s speeding habits, they plan to use the evidence against Puleo-Tague, similar to the case of the 2021 Oxford High School mass shooting in which Ethan Crumbley killed four students.
The gunman’s parents, James and Jennifer Crumbley, were the first parents convicted in a US mass school shooting and were sentenced to at least 10 years in prison each after a jury found they could have prevented their teenage son from possessing a gun.
Currently, no charges have been filed against Puleo-Tague.
Now facing second-degree murder for the death of his friend, Tague is not being charged as an adult but instead as an “adult designated,” meaning if he is convicted, the judge could sentence him as an adult or a juvenile or impose a blended sentence.
“I want him in prison for as long as possible,” said Vanker, maintaining he deserves no leniency. “Why should he get a break? This kid had every break and every privilege there is.”
The Post reached out to the teen’s lawyer for comment.
In Michigan, second-degree murder carries a maximum sentence of life in prison.
Tague is still awaiting a trial date.
