For a central-Maine family that just lost twin toddlers in a hit-and-run tragedy the question is how much pain can a grandmother endure.
Martha Collins has now lost three young grandsons to fatal accidents in eight years.
In 2017, her 5-year-old grandson William Egold drowned in Vassalboro after the canoe he and his mother Mollie Egold were in overturned.
Collins described him at the time as a “spectacular little boy” with a “zest for life.”
As if that weren’t painful enough, now she and her family are mourning the deaths of her two younger grandsons In a small town just northeast of the state’s capital city of Augusta.
Two-and-a-half-year-old twins Bradley and Noah along with their mother were struck July 11 in Albion by a car while she was taking them in their stroller to a local market.
Bradley died at the scene. Noah was transported to a Portland hospital, where he died July 15.
“He is in heaven with Bradley,” said family friend Karen Deveau, who is sponsoring a GoFundMe drive to pay for the boys’ funerals.
Their mother is still hospitalized with multiple injuries. “She is broken,” her mother said.
Benjamin Lancaster, 44, was later nabbed and arrested on several charges including running from a fatal accident.
For Lancaster, Collins has no mercy. “He murdered them,” she said. “This was murder.”
The fund drive for the family had raised $47,000 of its $50,000 goal by July 18.
“Services will not proceed until Mollie is out of the hospital,” Deveau said. “I would like this fund to buy one plot near William’s where the twins will be laid to rest.”
“Mollie will be laid to rest when her time comes with William so the four of them will be together for eternity,” Deveau said. “I also want to purchase a nice headstone for the twins.”
While no one could begrudge the grandmother for feeling bitter about her tragic losses – and three in so few years – she is simply full of gratitude.
“The donations, the love, the caring, people I don’t even know are coming forward to help us,” she told WGME’s Brad Rogers through tears.
“It’s been unbelievable, and I just want to thank everybody who’s helping us.”
Rogers, who has now covered her losses both in 2017 and now, was wondering as he interviewed Collins how she copes with such pain.
“Let me tell you, I haven’t yet,” Collins said. “I don’t think Mollie has either. We are just, like, in a state of ‘how could this happen?’”
