Kevin Miner, a PE teacher and the golf coach at Saugus High School, remembers the student’s smile.
Crystal Hilstein, an English teacher at Saugus, remembers his selflessness, and her husband, Richard, remembers his sarcasm and dry sense of humor.
Students at Saugus High School will remember his name forever.
In a small ceremony in the Courtyard of Courage just outside the front entrance to the school, former U.S. Marine and L.A. County sheriff’s deputy Jonathan Buchan had his name memorialized on a plaque on the Wall of Honor after dying last year.
“This is very special to have him remembered here at the school where he was,” said his father, Ken Buchan.
Jonathan died on Jan. 20, 2023, at the age of 33 from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Hundreds of sheriff’s deputies, as well as current and former Marines, were at his memorial in 2023, where it was said that he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder following two tours in Afghanistan.
“We didn’t realize he was suffering from serious PTSD, and that’s a real thing,” Ken said.
Miner said his oldest son entered the Marines because of Jonathan’s relationship with him. The Miner family attended Jonathan’s graduation ceremony.
“Jon’s still to this day a very special person to me and it’s pretty awesome that, you know, he gets a special plaque,” Miner said. “It’s unfortunate, but it’s well-deserved. He was a phenomenal young man.”
Richard, a fire patrol captain with the U.S. Forest Service at Angeles National Forest, said he met Jonathan when he was still in high school. He told the story of when Jonathan used to help his dad cutting down trees, and one time, they went to cut down a big palm tree at the Hilstein residence.
“It was a very tall one, always scared her when the wind would blow,” Richard said. “However, one of the days he went up and we discussed cutting it down. He climbed all the way to the very top, and I got a video of him cutting the top of it off, and him on the tree, swinging side to side. I’m going, ‘Oh my God, I’m gonna have to call his parents. He’s gonna get flown off.’ It was straight out of a cartoon, exactly that. And he just laughed it off.”
Crystal talked about how Jonathan used to play the bagpipes in the quad at Saugus High and the many different ways that he showed his love for others. One of those was after the Nov. 14, 2019, shooting at the school.
“Jon had jumped police barricades at my house and jumped through the backyard to be able to check to make sure I was OK,” Crystal said. “That’s the kind of man that we’re honoring today, that this plaque honors.”
Friends and family gathered for a prayer after the short ceremony. The plaque is sponsored by and paid for by the Centurion Foundation, a nonprofit that supports the academic, arts, athletic and extracurricular programs at Saugus High School.
