Three weeks before his 18th birthday, in August 2021, Jaydon and two friends were tinkering on a car before taking it out for a test spin.
Two miles north of Sweetser, in rural Indiana, the rambunctious teens were speeding on a bumpy country road when the driver, Jaydon’s best friend, went over a bump and lost control of the vehicle.
They went careening off the road, struck a pole, before tumbling into a yard. The vehicle flipped some five times before finally coming to rest on the grass. The car was totaled.
Conscious but badly shaken, Jaydon was able to free himself from the passenger’s seat. He kicked out the window and, in a daze, fading in and out of consciousness, he managed to pull his cousin from the back seat….