By Joe Gerrety
jgerrety@journalandcourier.com

Friends of Jeremy L. Kuns said the 19-year-old quietly set an example among his peers for doing what's right.

So Travis Fisher, one of those friends, said he'll wait to observe Grant L. O'Leary before expressing an opinion about what should happen to the man who admitted driving drunk and causing a crash that killed Kuns.

"I think it's all according to his attitude toward it," Fisher, of Flora, said, noting O'Leary appeared to be remorseful during his plea hearing Monday in Tippecanoe Superior Court 2. "He wasn't getting defensive at all."

Based on his plea agreement, O'Leary, 24, could face up to 36 years in prison when he is sentenced Nov. 9 by Judge Thomas Busch, but the entire sentence could be served on probation.

In court Monday, a soft-spoken and downcast O'Leary answered questions posed by his attorney, Michael Trueblood, informing the court that he is currently undergoing substance abuse treatment as part of a court pretrial release program.

O'Leary pleaded guilty to operating a vehicle while intoxicated causing death while having a prior conviction for drunken driving, a Class B felony; leaving the scene of a fatal crash, a Class C felony; and being a habitual substance offender.

The plea agreement allows Kuns' family members to make sentencing recommendations to the court.

More than 30 friends and family members, most of them Old German Baptists, packed the courtroom for Monday's plea hearing. They did not comment during the hearing.

O'Leary had a blood-alcohol content of 0.14 percent after an April 27 crash on Indiana 25 North that killed Kuns. O'Leary was driving north and passing slower traffic on the two-lane road when he crashed head-on into Kuns' southbound motorcycle.

O'Leary left in the vehicle of a friend who came upon the crash scene.

At the time of the crash, O'Leary was on probation for an August 2005 misdemeanor conviction for drunken driving. He had an August 2004 conviction for drug possession and maintaining a common nuisance.