My
daughter, Jade, was murdered 28 days before her 19th birthday on
April 28th, 1996. Dwayne Woods is on death row in Walla Walla, Washington and I will
get to watch him take his last breath ----- someday. Jade, and two
other girls that are sisters were involved.
They
were all three beaten with a baseball bat, one at a time.
Jade
was also raped, and one of the girls was stabbed a few
times. He was the boyfriend of one of the girls, and
believe it or not, SHE is the one that lived. Jade and the
other girl both died. The one girl was brain dead right away,
and never came back.
Jade
talked to the doctors and police, and told everyone who did
it. The doctors were going to keep her in the hospital
overnight, then let her go home the next day. They said she
was going to have a real bad headache for a couple of days, but
should be fine.
At
6:00 that night, a blood clot dislodged from her brain, and she was
brain dead. They did tests for 24 hours, but she couldn't
breath on her own. I actually have 2 death dates because
of that. She actually died April 27th, but because they have
to do tests for 24 hours, the legal death date is April
28th.
I
will never stop loving and missing her. My heart hurts all the
time. Jade has two brothers, which I am so thankful for. We
were lucky, our trial went smoothly and we took it as far as we
could.
I've
become a cemetery mom. That has become my place of
comfort. I have all kinds of things glued to the cement
surrounding her headstone. Pictures of her, poems, hearts,
anything I can find that will work. Her 21st birthday was I think
the hardest "event" for me to get through.
