KENT — Jaron Brown always considered himself cheerful and optimistic.
But since March 19, 2024 — the day his 12-year-old son, Boyd “Buster” Brown, and three others were killed by a speeding driver near Renton — a new feeling has entered his daily life: hate.
He hates Tuesdays, the weekday his son died. He hates seeing cars weave through traffic. He hates driving through the intersection of Southeast 192nd Street and 140th Avenue Southeast, where the fatal collision happened.
But more than a year after the crash, the 45-year-old Fairwood father said he still cannot bring himself to hate the 19-year-old who killed his son, Chase Daniel Jones.
Brown was among nine people, mostly family members of the victims, to share the impact the crash had on their lives during Jones’ sentencing at the Maleng Regional Justice Center in Kent on Friday.
After about an hour of emotional testimony, including a video montage of the four victims’ lives and letters by Jones and his parents read aloud by the teen’s attorney, King County Superior Court Judge Mark Larrañaga sentenced Jones to 17 ½ years in prison.
Framed photos of the victims and their families lined the room, all facing the judge.
“Nothing I do or say today is going to alleviate anyone’s pain,” Larrañaga said before announcing Jones’ sentence, his voice shaking. “I sincerely wish it could, but sadly the law falls short of that promise.”
Jones pleaded guilty April 3 to four counts of vehicular homicide and two counts of vehicular assault in the crash, which killed Buster Brown; sisters Matilda Wilcoxson, 13, and Eloise Wilcoxson, 12; and the driver of the car, Andrea Hudson, 38, who is not related to the children who died. Two of Hudson’s children, then 12 and 14, were in the car and severely injured.
Hudson and the children were traveling in her minivan when Jones, driving 112 mph and weaving in and out of traffic, sped his Audi “like a missile” through a red light and T-boned them, said King County Senior Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Amy Freedheim.
The Audi, which Jones had bought one month before the crash, was the third car he had totaled in a crash within 11 months. Speed was a factor in all three collisions, but police did not cite Jones in the first two crashes, prosecutors said.
Before his sentencing, Jones’ attorney, Brad Barshis, read a letter by the 19-year-old in which he said he was “was addicted to speed,” and used it to ignore his problems. He apologized to the victims’ families and thanked them for their forgiveness after making the “biggest mistake of (his) life.”
“With time, I will find a way to make something positive out of this and others who choose this behavior,” Barshis read from the letter as Jones wept in the seat next to him. “It will haunt me for the rest of my life.”
In their own letter, Jones’ parents, Daniel and Kimberly Jones, apologized to the victims’ families, saying they had spent the last year reflecting on “where (they) went wrong.”
“If we could take their places, we would not hesitate,” Barshis read from their letter. “We have grieved for your losses nonstop and will continue for the rest of our days.”
Many of the victims’ family members who testified described a shared Christian faith that connected them to each other and buoyed them through a year of unimaginable grief. Most said they hoped to find a balance between forgiving Jones and holding him accountable for what they considered a preventable tragedy.
The Brown, Hudson and Wilcoxson families had been close friends for several years, becoming like family to one another, said Matilda and Eloise’s mother, Rivka Wilcoxson.
“We want our sons to grow up to be like Buster. We want our daughters to grow up to be like Andrea. I want to grow up to be like Andrea,” she said. “The loss of any one of them would have been devastating. The loss of all of them at once is unspeakable.”
Hudson’s husband, Abe Hudson, said life with his high school sweetheart and wife of 20 years had felt “close to perfect.” He and their three children are still coping with her death, along with permanent injuries two of the kids sustained in the crash. Their son, Nolan, will have a limited range of motion for the rest of his life, and their daughter, Charlotte, will never fully recover from her traumatic brain injury, Abe Hudson said.
“Our world and the dream we had created shattered,” he said.
A video montage highlighted the lives of four people and their families who loved the outdoors, time spent together and frequent bouts of laughter.
A bashful Buster was shown playing the ukulele, reading to his sister and sprinting across a soccer field, an enormous grin across his face. Matilda and Eloise appeared in the video laughing and playfully pushing each other as they backpacked up a forested trail. Andrea Hudson was shown holding one of her children in her lap as they admired a sunset, then leading her children in a song.
Family members packed the courtroom, many weeping as they listened to the testimony.
As part of a plea agreement, Jones was ordered to pay restitution of an undetermined amount, spend 18 months in community supervision after his release from prison and to only drive a car equipped with a speed-limiting device, which would prevent his vehicle from going more than 10 mph over any posted speed limit.
Larrañaga also ordered Jones to have no contact with the victims’ families, but all three families asked the judge to rescind that part of the sentence so Jones could contact them in the future, if he wished to. The judge obliged.
After the sentencing, several members of the victims’ families embraced Jones’ family members. The crowd, and their supporters, gathered outside the courtroom, some holding each other.
Among those gathered was Washington state Rep. Mari Leavitt, D-University Place, who said she was inspired by the victims’ families to sponsor House Bill 1596. Also called the “BEAM Act” — for Buster, Eloise, Andrea and Matilda — the bill mandates installing speed-limiting devices in the cars of anyone applying for a restricted driver’s license after having their license suspended for accumulating too many speeding tickets.
The House and Senate approved the bill, which is now awaiting Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson’s signature.
Jaron Brown said he supports the bill, along with any effort to “slow people down.”
“I don’t have any joy in seeing another life ruined by jail,” he said outside the courtroom before Jones’ sentencing. “But accountability and deterrence are important too, and those ideals are bigger than me and my feelings. Bigger than Chase.”