Reckless Love

When Chaz Green hit Caitlin Miller's car at almost 80 miles an hour on a wet summer night last year, residents of Claylick Road, a narrow, winding stretch of tarmac in rural Dickson County, thought a bomb had gone off.

"It was so loud it sounded like it should've been in the living room," Heather Creech told police. "I could see taillights at the church. I could hear horrible screams."

Inside her ruined 2004 Ford Explorer Sport Trac, 17-year-old Caitlin Miller, a pretty, soon-to-be high school senior, had sustained a severe brain injury that would kill her within days. Green, her 19-year-old boyfriend, didn't have a scratch on him. He climbed out of his two and-a-half-ton Ford F250 Super Duty pickup, pulled Miller out of her truck through a broken window and laid her body on the damp pavement of the church parking lot where her car ended up.

Then, according to eyewitness Heather Creech, who rushed to Caitlin's side, he called his father.

"The girl was moaning," Creech told police, also saying that she "couldn't smell anything but blood" on Caitlin. "The girl was making eye contact with me and squeezing my hand. The boy just walked away. [He] was on a cell phone saying, 'Daddy, I don't know what to do. I think she's gonna die. I'm sorry for messing up the truck.' "

It is unclear whether Green called 911 before or after speaking with his father, but when he did, he was clearly distressed, crying and begging the dispatcher to hurry while intermittently shouting Caitlin's name in an urgent, tear-filled falsetto. "She's lying here unconscious," he frantically tells the dispatcher. "I think she may be OK, she's OK, she's breathing, her heart's beating. I just need somebody here quick.... Please sir!"

In a matter of moments, EMTs, police and Mark Green, Chaz's father, arrived.

As the emergency professionals got to work, Chaz became more and more agitated. He told one witness, "It's my fault, and we've been drinking." Witness Creech said that Chaz was slurring his words, and that she smelled alcohol on his breath.

Green also told those at the scene that he and Caitlin had been arguing and that they were "chasing each other down." Dickson County Sheriff's Officer Clint Hopper approached the Greens, asking Mark if his son was the driver.

"Yes," Green replied, "and the other driver is his girlfriend. Please don't bother us with your nonsense right now. We have more important things going on."

Within minutes Caitlin Miller would be on a Life Flight helicopter to Vanderbilt's trauma center. No drug or alcohol test was conducted on Chaz Green that night, because officials at the scene allowed him and his father to leave for Nashville to be "observed for any injuries," though he appeared unhurt.

She would die there after remaining in a coma for four days. Five months later, Chaz Green would be booked for vehicular homicide. Bail was set at $5,000 and Green turned himself in, bailed himself out, and never spent a night in jail. A grand jury would later indict him on the charge and his trial is scheduled to begin Nov. 13.

Whether Green meant to end Miller's life as he climbed into his truck that night is irrelevant. All that matters is that Green pushed his truck to nearly 80 miles an hour in a posted 45 zone on a dark, wet night. As far as Assistant District Attorney Carey Thompson is concerned, the recklessness of that action is good enough for guilty.

Even before this tragic accident, Chaz Green lived a troubled life. He had a volatile temper, ran afoul of the law and had a history of harassing the young women in his life.

But now, Green can't charm his way out of his problems. If convicted, District Attorney Thompson will recommend Green face the maximum penalty of three to six years in prison.

Thompson says he's not interested in a settlement and is confident the case will go to trial.

But a guilty verdict is far from assured. Green's family has retained Jim Todd, one of the best defense attorneys in Nashville and a former Davidson County prosecutor. Todd has already succeeded in getting much of the prosecution's character evidence regarding Green's treatment of Caitlin thrown out.

"The judge correctly ruled [that evidence] wasn't relevant," Todd says. "When this accident happened, a lot of quote-unquote 'stories' came out of the woodwork [about Chaz]. No one has raised their right hand and come into a courtroom to say they were true."

For some who knew Caitlin Miller, Green's guilt is not an open question.

"He did it on purpose," says Miller's friend Shea Clabo. Miller's mother, Colleen Sharp, shares this sentiment, and last month, Miller's family filed a $5 million civil suit against Chaz and his parents. The suit claims that Chaz "knowingly and intentionally caused the crash that ended Caitlin's life."

Chaz and Caitlin began dating five or six months before she died.

There are pictures of her from that time, beaming and smiling confidently or striking the kind of brooding, self-serious poses teenagers think they can pull off. In all these images, Caitlin has the fresh, pretty look of an American teenager in full bloom. Her skin is unblemished and her short, dirty-blond hair is tossed in a motion so exuberant, even the camera cannot completely arrest it.