Boy, 12, ‘didn’t have a chance’

EVERETT – Tim Atlee stood in his driveway Tuesday morning whittling a notch in a piece of pine with his pocketknife.

He was carving a cross for a boy he didn’t know but who once reminded Atlee what it was like to be a kid again.

The night before, Atlee, 37, raced to the child’s side as he lay crumpled in the road. A truck had struck the boy while he rode his skateboard in the street with two other boys in the Lowell neighborhood.

Justin Freeman, 12, was on S. Third Avenue when he was hit. He was thrown across Main Street, suffering head and leg injuries that would prove fatal.

“He was looking at me like ‘Help me,’ and there was nothing I could do,” Atlee said Tuesday. “I feel so bad. He shouldn’t have had his life taken away. He didn’t have a chance, the poor kid.”

Witnesses told police the driver didn’t stop but drove north and turned onto a side street, Everett police Sgt. Boyd Bryant said. Investigators searched throughout the day Tuesday for the driver and the pickup.

Carrie Butsch, Justin’s mother, said her son was in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong person when he was mortally injured.

Butsch sat on her front porch Tuesday and looked at the front yard that used to be her son’s playground.

She is a single mother and works 50 hours each week at a Taco Time in Mukilteo.

Justin and his two brothers lived with their mother. His father lives elsewhere in the state.

Butsch said she struggled to keep Justin on the right track.

Justin had gone to the Forest Park Swim Center in Everett on Monday evening with his cousin, Morgan Oakley, 12, and another, older boy, Butsch said. The boys were headed home.

Justin had a trick where he’d get down on his belly on the skateboard to glide along the street. That’s what he was doing Monday when he was struck, Morgan said.

Morgan, who was riding a bike, said he stopped to let Justin catch up. He looked back and saw a white truck hit Justin.

“I saw him go up in the air, and he started rolling,” Morgan said.

Morgan went to tell Justin’s mother.

“I ran up the hill and saw him laying on the ground, all broken up,” Butsch said. “He wasn’t conscious at all.”

Butsch rode with her son in the ambulance to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.

At about 1:20 a.m., doctors told Butsch that her son would not survive.

“We went in and said our goodbyes, and there was a tear on his face,” she said. “I hope he heard us.”

A matter of time

People in the Lowell neighborhood say they knew it was only a matter of time before someone would die on the streets in their neighborhood.

Speeding traffic is an issue that comes up at nearly every meeting of the Lowell Neighborhood Association, President Carma Collins said.

Lowell was once a secluded area, separated from Everett by I-5 and a strong sense of neighborhood pride among the residents. As Everett grew, Lowell’s quiet streets became popular detour routes for commuters to avoid I-5 and other snarled areas.

Lea Provence, who works in Shoreline and lives in north Everett, said she uses a route through the neighborhood to avoid congestion on the freeway.

“It’s easier to go that way than sit on the freeway for an hour and a half,” she said.

She said she has noticed groups of skateboarders and kids not paying attention to traffic.

“I’m dreadfully sorry the child is gone,” Provence said. “Parents need to realize that’s a shortcut now.”

The change doesn’t sit well with neighbors, who say they’ve been asking for help with traffic for years.

“People think it’s the damn highway,” Atlee said. “It’s going to take a little boy’s life for something to happen.”

The neighborhood has held “Safety Week” several times in years past, Lowell resident Gail Chism said.

“We held signs that said, ‘Please slow down, we love our children,’ ” Chism said.

Collins said police do what they can to patrol the area, but she believes the speeding will only get worse. Plans are in place to transform the neighborhood’s riverfront into a center for shopping and urban-style living.

Other Lowell residents say police have ignored pleas for speed bumps and stop signs.

“We’ve asked police for years to patrol S. Third Avenue more heavily, and what happened there was a direct result of the fact that people think this is an OK area to speed,” Lowell resident Michelle Hoverter said.

Speed unknown

Police have not determined whether the vehicle that struck Freeman was speeding, said Everett police Sgt. Mike Franc-kowiak, who handles traffic complaints for the Lowell neighborhood.

He said police have responded to the neighborhood’s concerns with increased patrols and radar crackdowns on speeders.

“We have put forth a great effort down there, but right now, I have complaints in every area,” he said. “Of course the neighbors there think it’s the worst area, but that’s not necessarily the case. There are speeders everywhere.”

Franckowiak said the neighborhood should wait until police determine whether the vehicle that hit Justin was speeding.

Justin was going to be in seventh grade this fall at Evergreen Middle School.

Evergreen and other Everett schools will have counselors available when the school year starts sometime after Labor Day, said Mary Waggoner, Everett Public Schools spokeswoman.

“We will remember Justin as a student who loved being outside, playing hard with his friends, and always asking to have PE for the entire day,” said Evergreen principal Joyce Stewart in a written statement. “He loved life and activity. We will miss his smile.”

Atlee, who has lived in Lowell since 1977, was working on his car in the garage when he heard the boys coming down the road on their skateboards. He stopped to watch.

“I used to ride my skateboard around here. Watching them reminded me of being a little kid,” he said.

Atlee turned his attention back to his car. He remembered hearing a “humming noise from tires” and the impact.

Justin was in the road. Atlee ran to him, screaming for someone to call 911. He looked up to see truck’s taillights, already about four blocks away.

“I had the chance to get in my car and go after him. I just couldn’t leave the boy alone,” Atlee said.

Atlee believes he has seen the truck in the area before. He wondered why the driver didn’t stop.

“I didn’t hear any braking noise, no screech of tires,” Atlee said. “Whoever did this, hopefully they’ll do the right thing and come forward. What if it was their kid?”

Herald writer Melissa Slager contributed to this report.

Reporter Diana Hefley: 425-339-3463 or hefley@heraldnet.com.