‘A DEAR FRIEND’

Teen Drummer Fatally Crushed by Recycling Truck After Climbing Into Dumpster

Kellen Bischoff’s body was found at a Pennsylvania recycling facility on Saturday morning, hours after he was spotted leaving a house party, officials said.

A 19-year-old from New Jersey crawled into a dumpster after attending a house party last weekend—and was crushed to death by a garbage truck collecting waste, Pennsylvania officials said Tuesday. The body of Kellen Bischoff was discovered on Saturday morning among the detritus at a Birdsboro recycling facility, according to the Berks County District Attorney’s Office. He was identified by his “unique” tattoos, the district attorney added in a statement. Investigators found that he’d been visiting a relative in nearby Kutztown, and had last been seen leaving a party off-campus from Kutztown University. Security footage from the scene showed Bischoff walking alone before climbing into the dumpster, which stood outside the back of a Kutztown Dollar Tree, detectives wrote. An autopsy subsequently revealed no signs of foul play, with toxicology results still pending on Tuesday, the district attorney said. In a GoFundMe for the Bischoff family, Kellen’s friends identified him as “the drummer in our band Hellfire,” remembering him as a “very dedicated and passionate” musician, as well as “a dear friend.”