Brennan Loveless remembered as 'beautiful soul' during candlelight vigil

State Route 79 in Colesville was a steady line of pickup trucks and SUVs headed for Harpursville Central School on Thursday, an almost unusual sign of life for a small rural community on the northeastern edge of Broome County.

More than 150 community members assembled on the northern edge of the football field for a solemn candlelight vigil honoring the life of Brennan Loveless, a 13-year-old from Sanitaria Springs who died early Monday after he was struck by a pickup truck while riding his bike.

“He was such a wild child,” recalled Brennan’s cousin, 16-year-old Donovyn Rowe of Afton. “Always a daredevil. He’d do anything you’d tell him to.”

When his cousins wouldn’t take the dare, Donovyn said, Brennan never hesitated to pull the stunt himself – backflipping off the porch, and building bike ramps “out of any scrap of wood he could find.”

Brennan was outside almost constantly and “always on that bike,” according to his mother, Christina Loveless.

She said she found some comfort in that her youngest “died doing what he loved.”

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Brennan spent New Year’s Day like he would most any other: riding his bike. He was a few hundred yards from the family home on state Route 7 when he was struck by a passing pickup truck, which continued eastward from the scene without stopping, according to the Broome County Sheriff’s Office.

Brennan was brought by ambulance to UHS Wilson Medical Center and transferred to Upstate Golisano Children’s Hospital in Syracuse, where he was pronounced dead shortly after midnight Monday.

Later that day, the Broome County Sheriff’s Office issued an alert for the vehicle, a gray pickup with front-end damage on the passenger’s side, and asked nearby residents to review home security footage for possible sightings.

The alleged driver, 34-year-old Bradley Law of Harpursville, had been found around 12 hours after the crash when he called to report a different crash with the same truck on Bevier Street in Kirkwood. Law told dispatchers he swerved into a ditch to avoid hitting a deer, according to the sheriff’s office.

Law was charged with criminally negligent homicide and leaving the scene of a fatal accident, both felonies.

Brennan thrived with family and his outdoor pursuits

For all the time Brennan spent outdoors, much of it was with family and close friends.

Brennan, the youngest of three children, lived just up the road from his grandparents, Karen and Tim Hall. His cousins – Donovyn, Darryn and Braelynn Rowe – were frequent visitors from their home in Afton.

Ten-year-old Braelynn remembered Brennan’s smirking satisfaction when he pulled his “coin trick,” yanking out a dollar bill from beneath a stack of coins without toppling them.

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The cousins recalled many summer evenings spent catching fireflies on the property and regular hunting trips with “Poppy,” their grandfather, who helped Brennan bag his first turkey just before his death.

“He was a beautiful soul,” Tim Hall said of his late grandson. “Just a simple, simple kid.”

Cody Pruitt, a neighbor Brennan’s age, recalled the pair’s first meeting three years prior.

“Brennan just wandered into my backyard one day and asked to jump on my trampoline,” Cody told the mourners gathered at the vigil. “We’d been friends ever since.”

A classmate from East Learning Center in Binghamton remembered Brennan’s first day, when the other students weren’t sure yet what to make of their new classmate.

“He backflipped off a table,” Brennan’s friend said at the vigil. “That was the moment when everyone loved him.”

East Learning Center students and staff presented Brennan’s family with a stack of handmade cards and a painted portrait of him, a class project in their first few days back from winter break.

“I knew my kids were out in the community, but I never knew the community could pull together like this,” Christina Loveless said. “I’m just lost for words.”

Donations to the family can be made at gofund.me/8ea9f387.

This article originally appeared on Binghamton Press & Sun-Bulletin: Brennan Loveless remembered days after being killed in hit-and-run