TUESDAY, MAY 17 , 2022. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ M2 B3
prom. Her daughter never had
her senior prom, thanks to the
coronavirus pandemic. She had a
dress, though.
So the plan for a prom of
second chances, of hope, of being
better every day, was launched.
The woman, in college now,
brought a friend, and they drove
up from Norfolk. My son
decorated the undercarriage of
Ian’s chair with LED light strips
and helped shove his feet into
purple and black high top
sneakers. Ian put everyone at
ease with colostomy bag jokes.
We tried to find a limo but
ended up using the accessible van
the Gonzaga community had
helped the family with as Ian
recovered. “Let’s just go with
that,” Tucker said.
She wanted to be nearby — but
not hover. It would be his first big
outing alone and she wanted to
be close in case anything went
wrong, but not too close to
smother her teenage son. I came
for moral support and the light
beers we nursed for three hours.
We talked about college, what
the accessible dorm for Ian will
be like and how much the boys
are looking forward to being on
their own.
Three hours and we didn’t
hear a word from them. They
were busy having a blast.
She left nothing to chance in
the days leading up to that night.
The valet was called ahead. The
restaurant prepared for the room
his chair would take up. She
scouted out the right entrance to
the prom. He had been through
so much. She wanted this night
to be just right.
And then we forgot the tickets.
No worries. They knew Ian was
coming; moving ahead, ever
forward. A little better every day.gregarious, bright, athletic guy
was in an induced coma.
“Docs think Ian had mono (a
very common Epstein Barr type
virus), and as his immune system
fought off the mono, it also went
rogue and started attacking
nerve membranes in his brain
and spinal cord,” Tish wrote on
the CaringBridge page that
would carry Ian’s story. “This
[led] to him not being able to
move himself, or speak, or breath
reliably on his own.”
Ian was at Inova Fairfax, using
his eyes to communicate with his
mom and breathing through a
tube, then at Children’s Hospital
of the King’s Daughters in
Norfolk, the closest bed they
could find for his recovery
process.
He didn’t do anything wrong,
we kept thinking, as we tried to
process what happened. This
wasn’t a car accident or risky
behavior or karma for any of the
abhorrent things teen boys do.
There’s no lesson or cause or
march or petition for his loved
ones to sign, no legislation for us
to throw our energy into.
It just sucked.
“If you aren’t moving forward,
where else are you going?” he
said, when I asked how he retains
his trademark positivity.
“He’s like a cat,” he once said of
my son, who was being surly
during a trip we all took to
DVORAK FROM B1 California last year, before this
happened. The gang was headed
back out after a day of activity.
My son was tired and
overwhelmed and didn’t want to
go. Ian understood. “Sometimes
he just needs to be left alone.”
Since the first day the two met
at freshman orientation, Ian
always included my slightly
reclusive boy in any gathering
and invited him into his circle.
Ian’s that kid who will always sit
beside the one eating alone at
lunch.
He met this challenge by
becoming more fully himself; he’s
teaching us along the way.
Ian had a cult following in all
the hospitals. The nurses at Inova
Fairfax had a huge, emotional
going-away parade when he was
discharged. The Gonzaga boys
gathered outside and sang the
Gonzaga song as he was rolled
into an ambulance for his
transfer.
Throughout the hospital, the
staff began talking about the
charismatic kid upstairs.
Outside, a stranger passing by
said: “You’re Ian!”
In Norfolk, he was featured in
the hospital magazine after
doctors quickly learned he was
the best choice to test new
equipment, to pair with
incoming kids who were
devastated by their
circumstances, to be an
ambassador for a new life he
never asked for.
PETULA DVORAK
Gonzaga student s pent
seven months in hospitals
Miles T. Hall, 52, of Triangle.
Someone heard gunshots in
the parking lot before an SUV was
“seen leaving the area at a high
speed,” police said in a statement.
No suspects have been
identified, and police said they
are trying to figure out a motive.
Officials said the incident does
not appear to be random.
Two other people were killed in
an unrelated homicide Sunday in
the county, officials said.
Just after 4 p.m., police said
they went to the Woodbridge
Station apartments in the 13600
block of Mary’s Way, less than a
mile from Route 1, in Woodbridge,
for a report of damaged property.
A resident had found a bullet hole
in his ceiling that police said
seemed to have “come from the
above apartment.” A bullet
fragment was also found on the
floor of his apartment.
When officers went to the
apartment above, they got no
answer and asked a maintenance
worker to open it. Inside, officers
found two men with gunshot
wounds. They were pronounced
dead at the scene.
Officials said that there was
“no sign of forced entry into the
apartment” and that the shooting
does not appear to be random.
The two victims were identified
as Malik Xavier Lamar Davis of
Woodbridge and Christian Jamar
Roberts of Dumfries. They were
both 23.
Both cases remain under
investigation.
— Dana HedgpethMARYLAND
Man killed in crash
in Prince George’s
A Temple Hills man was killed
Sunday morning in a crash
involving two vehicles in Prince
George’s County, police s aid.
Moses Yogaraj, 71, was driving
westbound in the 9000 block of
Central Avenue in unincorporated
Capitol Heights at about
10:55 a.m. Sunday when he tried
to make left turn into a shopping
center, Prince George’s County
police investigators said. His car
was hit by another car driving east
on Central Avenue, police said.
Yogaraj died at the scene.
The driver of the other car,
whom police did not identify, was
taken to the hospital with injuries
that authorities said were not life-
threatening.
— Katie Mettler
VIRGINIA
3 killed in 2 different
incidents, police say
Three people were killed in two
separate incidents in Prince
William County.
At about 9:12 p.m. Sunday in
the 3600 block of Tavern Way,
roughly two miles from Interstate
95 in the Triangle area, police
found a man in a parking lot
suffering from gunshot wounds
to his upper body. He was
pronounced dead at the scene.
The man was later identified as
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Kelly's
WashingtonHe is away. His
column will resume when he returns.On superhero day at the
hospital, he let them stuff his
long legs through a child-size
Buzz Lightyear costume, and he
wheeled around the halls,
making the little kids laugh. Even
the kid who took five bullets in a
mass shooting only he survived
unclenched and began to look to
his future after doctors paired
him with Ian.
“A little better every day, every
day a little better,” is what Ian
and his mom would say.His first real meal in three
months was nachos. He began
breathing on his own, first for
two hours, then eight hours, then
12 hours. He caught up in school,
applied to college and chose
James Madison University. His
essay, which he finished over the
summer, didn’t mention any of
this.
By March, the tube was gone
and his neck wound began to
heal. He planned to change his
major from filmmaking tonursing. His upper body strength
returned. His core strengthened.
He could shoot hoops. From the
chair.
So far, the MRIs have shown
little sign of movement below his
waist.
“We should go to prom
together,” he told my son back in
March. “I want to dance at prom
and walk at graduation.”
One of the respiratory
therapists working with him
heard the boys talking aboutPETULA DVORAK/THE WASHINGTON POST
A friend helps Ian Balutis, 18, g et ready for the Gonzaga College High School prom. Doctors say his
health ordeal was caused by a mono infection. The nurses at Inova Fairfax had a huge, emotional
going-away parade when he was discharged, because of his outgoing, positive personality.BY DAN MORSEA Montgomery County teen-
ager was charged with first-degree
murder, authorities said Monday,
after a four-month investigation
into the stabbing death of a high
school classmate whose body was
found in a Germantown creek.
The arrest of the 17-year-old,
who was charged as an adult in the
slaying of Jailyn Jones, also 17,
comes as officials continued
sounding the alarm over rising
violence among juveniles in Mary-
land’s largest county, just north of
Washington.
“We need to come together as a
community,” said Montgomery
County Council member Sidney
Katz (D-District 3), who chairs the
Public Safety Committee. “People
are concerned about safety — in
general, for children, and for
themselves.”
“We have seen an increase in
violence, particularly in the Ger-
mantown area recently that has
been really disturbing,” Mont-
gomery Police Chief Marcus Jones
said Monday, referring to crime
being committed by and against
juveniles. “We’re starting to see a
younger trend.”
He stressed that residents need
to speak with police if they see
trouble brewing among teens or if
they have information about spe-
cific cases.
“We want to assure the public
that we are doing our very best to
really try to stay on top of the
information, but we need cooper-
ation,” the chief said. “There needs
to be a call to action by our com-
munity to do something.”
Both the victim and suspect
were students at Northwest High
School and knew each other, offi-
cials said. The victim was found
with multiple stab wounds to his
head and torso on Jan. 24 in the
area of Grotto Lane and Great
Seneca Highway.The Washington Post generally
does not name juveniles charged
in crimes until they are in circuit
court. The 17-year-old suspect
made his first court appearance
Monday in district court, wherehis attorney, David Moyse, asked
that he be released to home deten-
tion with an ankle monitor.
Moyse said his client would not
flee and would show up for futurecourt hearings — as evidenced by
him never leaving the area during
the months he knew he was a
suspect and culminating in his
turning himself in on Sunday.
“He has not fled the jurisdic-
tion, even for a moment,” Moyse
said.
Detectives appear to have built
their case against the teenager in
large part on evidence found near
the scene, specifically a pair of
boots and jeans that had blood on
them, officials said. The items
were tested for DNA, authorities
alleged, with the tests showing
genetic material from both the
victim and the suspect.
“The DNA of the defendant was
on a pair of jeans that the victim’s
blood is on,” prosecutor Marybeth
Ayres said in court. “DNA of the
defendant was also on a pair of
boots that the victim’s blood is on.”
She added that the boots and
jeans appeared to have been dis-
carded on a path leading awayfrom the crime scene in the direc-
tion of the defendant’s home.
Moyse said the alleged genetic
evidence “offers itself to several
different theories and explana-
tions” consistent with his client’s
“complete innocence.” The attor-
ney declined to elaborate, saying it
is too early to delve into specifics.
“There’s no denying that this
was a vicious attack,” Moyse said.
“It’s a matter of making sure that
we follow the law.”
In court Monday, District Judge
John Moffett ordered the teen
held without bond.
Police allege that on Jan. 21, the
victim told a friend over social
media he was going to meet “Tay.”
Detectives were able to confirm,
through footage of a security cam-
era near Jones’s home, that he left
his residence about 4:30 p.m. on
Jan. 21, according to police.
His body was found three days
later. Investigators were eventual-
ly able to connect the nickname tothe 17-year-old suspect, police
said.
“The victim was stabbed many
times,” Ayres said in court.
Jones, the police chief, indicat-
ed there could be additional ar-
rests in the case. He declined to
detail any possible motives but
described the case as terrible for
both the suspect and the victim.
“This is a double tragedy, let’s
be real. We have a 17-year-old who
is under arrest for a murder,” the
chief said. “Mr. Jones is an abso-
lute tragedy. ... It makes no sense
that this young man has lost his
life.”MARYLAND
Police arrest 17-year-old in killing of classmate found in Germantown creek
“This is a doubletragedy, let’s be real.We have a 17-year-oldwho is under arrest fora murder.”
Marcus Jones,
Montgomery County police chief18 Months
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