Marion County mom mourns loss of son hit trying catch school bus
Mother reflects on crash that left son dead
Ebony White is doing her best to hold it together after her son, Ja'siah Williams, was hit and killed. The fifth-grade student at Reddick-Collier Elementary School died at UF Health Shands Hospital in Gainesville from injuries.
REDDICK, Fla. - Ebony White is doing her best to hold it together. Her 10-year-old son, Ja’siah Williams, died right before her eyes last week.
"I just want my son to be remembered as the most sweetest child that anybody could ever ask for," White said.
Ja’siah was hit by a car and killed early Wednesday morning while crossing County Road 318 in Marion County to get on his school bus, according to investigators.
"I would always tell him, ‘Do not go out in the road without me!’ So he would wait for me," White said. "This particular morning was different because he’d seen the bus stopping. And so he was just like, ‘Mom, there’s the bus!’"
She was walking a step behind him as she looked to the left to make sure the road was clear.
"I was thinking to myself, this car is going too fast. I didn’t even have time to think. By that time it was already too late for me to say anything. I moved out of the way of the car, and when I moved out of the way, it hit my son," White recalled.
It was pitch black outside. White said it’s a nightmare.
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"I went to go look for him. And all I could do was lay on his chest and as I was laying there, there was no heartbeat," White said.
She said one of the drivers that stopped ran over to perform CPR on Ja’siah.
"The look on her face had already told me what my ears told me. And, there’s no heartbeat," she said.
Ja’siah was rushed to Shands Hospital in Gainesville, but it was too late to save him. Ebony is now left with a big hole in her heart missing the love of her life.
"My son was always concerned of my well-being. He was always funny and always loving. He was always a loving child. No matter what was going on he wanted everybody to feel loved," she said.
Florida Highway Patrol (FHP) tells FOX 35 News that they are still in the beginning phases of their traffic homicide investigation. They hope to have it concluded in the next 90-120 days. An FHP spokesperson did point out that the child was in the road when he was hit.
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