Twenty-five years ago, our community was shaken by the news of a horrific crash that took the lives of two brothers, their teenage friend and a stranger who was coming home from the gym. While these losses were bad enough, it turns out the person responsible for the crash was a teenager himself and his reckless and foolish behavior created a nightmare that was just beginning.
The year 2000 was a different time. There was relatively no social media. It would be four years before Facebook was launched and seven years before the first iPhone was sold. Most of the high school kids had pagers or they carried quarters and used pay phones. If you wanted to talk to someone, you either picked up the phone or knocked on the door.
Tom and Alice Renolds were living a relatively quiet life in Canyon Country raising three boys. Tom worked for the L.A. Department of Water and Power and Alice was a computer lab specialist at the boys’ elementary school.
Feb. 17, 2000, was a regular school night at the Renolds home. Tim, the middle son and a senior at Canyon High School, wanted to go out and was picked up by some friends. Some time later that evening, Danny, who was only 15, also left the house.
Alice, Tom and the oldest son Scott were enjoying an evening at home when a group of teenagers came knocking on their door, hysterical. They told Alice they had come upon the crash scene not far from the Renolds’ home and could see Tim in one of the cars. They told Alice he looked like he was dead.
Alice began screaming. She told Scott to go look for Danny and she and Tom raced to the scene.
Sgt. Mike Shapiro was working traffic that night and said it was one he would never forget. Two of the occupants of the vehicle were alive and transported to the hospital. Three boys who were in the back seat were dead and the car they were in was upside down on top of another vehicle. That driver was also deceased. When Tom and Alice arrived looking for Tim, Shapiro would not let them near the vehicles but asked them to describe the clothing their son was wearing. Blue sweatshirt and jeans, they said. Shapiro then identified Tim. Within minutes Scott arrived and informed Tom and Alice that Danny had been picked up by his brother and his friends earlier in the evening. When Alice described Danny’s clothes to Shapiro, their worst fear was confirmed. Danny was thrown from the car and died instantly.
Three months later, the young driver, Marcus Lellan, was convicted of four counts of vehicular manslaughter and sentences to eight years. After serving four of those years and because he was a Danish citizen, Marcus was deported to Denmark as required by law.
The months that followed the death of her sons was unbearable for Alice. She sought comfort in support groups, but at the time she said it just wasn’t resonating with her. As dark thoughts engulfed her, Alice knew she had to find a way to use her grief to help others. She couldn’t save her sons, but she thought she could possibly save another teen.
In the Santa Clarita Valley it wasn’t uncommon to hear about teen drivers getting into an accident or causing a death. The William S. Hart Union High School District had a program called “Every 15 Minutes,” that referenced the statistic that every 15 minutes, someone in the U.S. dies in an alcohol-related traffic accident.
Juniors and seniors at the schools watched a mock-up of a horrific crash site on campus with students portraying a drunk driver and injured or dead passengers. Ambulances, coroner vans and police cars took students away and obituaries written by the parents of these victims were read over the school’s public address system. It was an amazing collaborative effort with local law enforcement, the court system, hospital, tow trucks, paramedics, the Fire Department, and funeral home, to name just a few.
Alice Renolds believed the program also needed to give some attention to reckless driving and speeding and she reached out to Sgt. Shapiro, who coincidentally ran Every 15 Minutes. She and Tom volunteered to speak at the assemblies and describe every step of their heartbreak they had to endure from identifying the boys’ bodies to arranging for their funerals. The pain and anguish the Renolds’ suffered was not lost on the students or the parents in the audience.
Every 15 Minutes rotated through the six high school campuses until the pandemic closed schools in 2019.
Today Alice and Tom live in the same house in Canyon Country and have both retired. They enjoy spending time with their two granddaughters, traveling and taking yoga classes at the Senior Center. Alice says she and Tom had to figure out a way to accept each other’s grief process but now they keep busy as co-leaders of Compassionate Friends, a grief group that allows parents and others to talk, cry, scream, laugh and share good times and bad times. “It’s a safe place,” Alice said.
“For us, being 25 years down the road, we want to show them there is a light at the end of the tunnel,” she said. “There is pain and nothing can take it away but it softens.”
Toward the back of Central Park, there is a Youth Grove with 121 concrete stumps, each bearing the phrase “Forever Young” and a young person’s name; all victims of drunk, impaired and reckless drivers. The Renolds participate in an annual Walk of Remembrance to the grove. For the Renolds, it’s something they can do to both honor their sons and raise awareness of an ongoing problem. They also spend time at the grove with young drivers who received tickets for a variety of offenses. Tom and Alice speak to them about the losses they’ve endured and, in turn, the young drivers learn about some of those memorialized in the grove.
The Renolds held another gathering at the Youth Grove on Monday to remember Tim and Danny with family, friends and community members.
Alice says she always wonders if she and Tom have made a difference. Yes, Alice, you have, by touching the lives of so many of us raising teens. Your boys will always be remembered.
Patti Rasmussen is a Santa Clarita resident.
