Jess Speaks at King County Target Zero Community Meeting

 March 27, 2025 King County Community Meeting (Target Zero)

Jaron and I were asked if we would be willing to attend and speak at this community meeting. Here's what I said: 

Last year on March 19th, my 12 year old son Buster Brown was in my best friend Andrea Hudson's car with his school mates and best buddies, Matilda and Eloise Wilcoxson, and Charlotte and Nolan Hudson, when a car going 112 miles per hour ran a red light and t-boned Andrea’s car, instantly claiming the lives of Andrea, Eloise, Matilda, and Buster, and putting the lives of Charlotte and Nolan Hudson in critical condition.  

When Sara Hallstead reached out to us and asked us if we would be willing to say a few words at this community meeting, my first instinct was to say no, and I knew everyone would understand if we did. But as time went on and I saw the daffodils pop up at the crash site, and the measures the community was taking to reach out to us, I felt like giving back a little.

I appreciate what you are doing here, and your efforts to make our community safer.  I’m not going to touch on my thoughts of how that should or could be done with the road 140th, I’ll leave that to the traffic experts. Instead what I want to do is just tell you my story, because I don’t want these four people who died last year, to just be numbers on a graph, data in a report. So let me give you a little glimpse into what March 19, 2024 was like for me.   

It was a beautiful, sunny spring day. March 19th 2024 was a Tuesday, a day that it was my turn to drive kids to the HOME program in Renton. So I picked up and then dropped off my son Buster, as well Andrea Hudson’s children Charlotte and Nolan at school. We were abnormally early in our drop off, so I decided to walk the kids in.  In the hallway of the school Buster said “Mom we are early, what should I do?” I shrugged and said “I don’t know buddy, I guess you can just go to class”.  We then said our last words to each other. . . He smiled and said “Ok, Bye Mom” and I said “Bye buddy” and turned his back and walked to class. 

Two and a half hours later, I was pulling out of my neighborhood, turning left onto 140th Ave when I saw a speeding car pass another car using the suicide lane headed south bound going what I estimated to be about 80 mph.  When I called my husband and told him that, I knew for once in my life I was not exaggerating.  It upset me.  I thought to myself “He’s going to kill somebody”.  It wasn’t too long later when I had finished my quick errand to the safeway in fairwood that I heard the sirens.  I drove to the intersection to see what had happened. It wasn’t taped off yet, so I was able to get a full view of the horrific scene.  A sick feeling sat in my stomach as my eyes took in the wreckage. The car that had been hit, didn’t look like a car anymore. I couldn’t tell which was the front and which was the back. I prayed for whoever was in that car and headed home. The sick feeling followed me.  When I walked in the door and didn’t hear or see Buster, I asked his brother where he was.  When he responded that he hadn’t seen him, my heart sank. Could the car I saw possibly have been Andreas? God please no I said.  I could still hear the sirens.  More sirens now.  I immediately called Andrea who didn’t pick up. I called Abe her husband, I asked him if he had heard from her and told him that she was late dropping off Buster.  He said he hadn’t. I told him there had been an accident, and maybe he should look on his maps to see where Andrea was and call me back. He never called back. I called my friend Rivka to ask her if she had heard anything from Andrea, she had not. I told her about the accident and we decided we needed to go and see. Moments later Rivka, Abe, and I made our way to the site all coming from different directions of the intersection, and taped off from being able to be together.  It took time for us to be able to know what was going on. But finally the officer said to me “There is a woman who knows you at the other end of the road and she wants to talk to you” I picked up. Rivka’s voice was shaky. “Jess that is Andreas car, and there is only one survivor- and its a boy”.  It wasn’t until about 30 minutes later that I was told by a chaplain that the surviving boy was was not my son.

 

Since that day almost a year ago, we have struggled as we’ve watched the Hudsons struggle to survive and recover from their injuries, and to watch Abe navigate not only their care, with all of the doctors appointments, therapy sessions, and health routines, but also navigate being a single dad to three children whose Mom did nothing but attend to their education, social, physical, and spiritual needs.  He has become not only the bread winner, but also the cook, the shopper, the meal planner, the homework partner, the play date planner, and so many other things that one can’t keep track.  Andrea was one of the most intentional mothers I’ve ever known and the dearest friend.  She was good through and through, loved the earth, loved her family, and was doing her best to be an active community member in all the communities she was a part of.  I’ve struggled as I’ve watched the Wilcoxsons, our dear friends mourn the loss of their precious girls, who were absolutely essential in the family roles they carried out on a daily basis in their home.  They were active, energetic, smart, kind, caring, and beautiful girls. I and my family loved them like family, and mourn their loss every single day.  Eloise played the violin and loved to run, and Tilly loved plants and being cozy. They both loved to jump in with all the rough and rowdy boys their age for sports, wrestling, and outdoor games.  And Buster, well, he’s our Buster. Tan. Talented, kind, a peacemaker, and someone who leaves behind a massive hole as the years go on and I wonder at who he would have been.  

Life is so precious, and I appreciate you community members, and king county traffic administrators who are willing to show up to something like this, to try to advocate for changes that will make our community better and safer on behalf of those precious members of our community who we have lost, as well as those of us here who are still living. Thank you again for your efforts in this.