Nine months later, parents cope with the grief of losing son in unsolved hit-and-run

OXFORD — In a video that evokes memories for Sheila and Ron Cole, their son, Xavier Fuentes, is trying to swallow cough medicine when his sister picks up a bottle of liquid chocolate and sprays it down his throat.

“That’s the atmosphere our family had,” Ron Cole said.

Fuentes, 16, was killed in an unsolved hit-and-run crash on an unlit stretch of Route 117 in Paris at around 8:30 p.m. March 15. He had attended a movie at Flagship Cinemas in Oxford with family members earlier in the evening but left and began walking to his grandparents’ home in Turner. His body was found by a passing motorist about four miles from the cinema.

The Coles, from Greenwood, are pleading with those responsible for his death as the emotional toll mounts.

In an interview in the Oxford Town Office on Friday, Sheila Cole — a town clerk — said sometimes anger dips into her sorrow and dark thoughts bob to the surface as she strives to forgive, as God tells her, and she wants justice.

“I want names,” she said. “I want names and I want to see the faces of those who left my child dead in the road. I want that. Yes, I do.”

She misses the teasing camaraderie of a compassionate, loving son, an evolving cook who hated washing dishes, the family’s de facto food critic who despite a sharp wit and stubbornness, was eager to please with a contagious, ear-to-ear smile.

“He was a good kid,” his mother said. “He was happy.”

Over the past nine months, she has asked herself questions that so far no one can answer: Why couldn’t the driver see Xavier? Did he try to run out of the road and the car swerved to miss him? Was the driver impaired?

But mostly, “What was so much more important that you couldn’t stop and help him? They left him like a bag of trash in the road. That’s my biggest question of all: Why’d you leave? It’s a terrible thing to kill someone and not have the conscience that you need to do something and deal with the situation.”

As she yearns for a measure of closure, routine is punctuated by grief — and anguish during birthdays and holidays.

“As crazy as it might sound, I like talking about him,” Sheila Cole said. “I like talking about what happened to him. I think it’s helpful. They need to know we’re hurting, they need to know what kind of person he was. We’re upset and angry about their choice.”

No one has been charged in the incident. In May, police identified suspects from the Lewiston-Auburn area and turned over a car from a Bangor rental business and other evidence to the Maine State Police Crime Laboratory in Augusta.

Paris police detective Jeffrey Lange said police are waiting for a DNA analysis of the evidence, which could take up to a year to process.

“If I’m frustrated, I know the family is frustrated,” Lange said.

The Coles said police have done a “phenomenal” job in the investigation, but they believe changes should be made at the Maine State Crime Lab to expedite the process.

“It’s not going to be over until someone is charged,” Ron Cole said.

Anyone with information or possible leads is asked to call the Paris Police Department at 207-743-7448 or email detective@parismaine.org.