A 36-year-old Hartville man is dead after his motorcycle left a rural Portage County road while he was rounding a curve, throwing him from the bike. Joshua Keener was riding his black 2014 Honda motorcycle on Swartz Road, west of Congress Lake Road in Suffield Township, when the crash happened around 10 p.m. on Oct. 31.
According to the Canton Repository, the Ohio State Highway Patrol said Keener's motorcycle drove off the right side of the road as he negotiated a curve, and he was thrown from the bike. The patrol reported that the exact cause of the crash remains under investigation. The Repository's account states Keener died at the scene, while his obituary, posted on Legacy.com, says he died due to his injuries on Nov. 1. Hoodline could not independently resolve the discrepancy between the two accounts.
Jordan Miller News reported that the crash site sits along Swartz Road west of Congress Lake Road in Suffield Township, matching the location and roughly 10 p.m. Saturday timeframe given by the patrol. The Ohio State Highway Patrol was assisted at the scene by the Portage County Sheriff's Office, the Suffield Township Fire Department and the Portage County Coroner's Office, the Repository's report noted.
A Graduate, Fiancé and Father Remembered
Keener graduated from Springfield High School in 2009 and leaves behind his fiancée and three children, according to his obituary as reported by the Canton Repository. His funeral service is scheduled for Thursday at 5 p.m. at Arnold Funeral Home in Hartville, per the obituary listing on Legacy.com.
A Second Fatal Crash in the Same Township
Keener's death marks the second fatal motorcycle crash to strike Suffield Township within roughly the past year. The Record-Courier reported that a Trumbull County man was indicted on charges tied to the death of his passenger in a motorcycle crash the previous October in the same township. That earlier crash, which happened in Portage County in October 2025, killed an Atwater Township woman, according to the Record-Courier.
In that case, the Record-Courier's initial indictment coverage identified the driver, Kyle D. Lallman, as 30, while the outlet's later report on his guilty plea listed him as 31. According to that later Record-Courier account, Lallman pleaded guilty to second-degree felony aggravated vehicular homicide, fourth-degree felony failure to comply with the order or signal of a police officer, and first-degree misdemeanor operating a vehicle under the influence during a Sept. 1 pretrial hearing. Nothing in the available reporting connects that case to Keener's crash.
Motorcycle Crashes Remain a Persistent Problem Statewide
Ohio's motorcycle fatality numbers underscore how often crashes like Keener's turn deadly. WKBN reported that from 2021 through 2025, Ohio saw 19,674 crashes involving motorcycles, of which 1,060 were fatal, resulting in 17,500 injuries and 1,096 deaths statewide. The same report found that 66% of motorcyclists killed and 60% of those injured in those crashes were not wearing a helmet.
A separate Ohio State Highway Patrol Traffic Safety Bulletin covering 2019 through 2023 recorded 19,544 motorcycle-involved crashes on Ohio roadways, including 1,015 fatal crashes that killed 1,045 motorcyclists and 12 others, plus another 5,770 motorcyclists seriously injured. The two reporting periods overlap but draw on different timeframes, underscoring how frequently serious motorcycle crashes occur across the state even as investigators in Suffield Township continue working to determine what caused Keener's bike to leave the road.
