‘Partners and great adventurers’: mourners remember boys killed in Leavenworth home
Photos of Logan and Austin Jackson stood tall on either side of two wooden caskets Monday morning.
Loved ones gathered to celebrate Logan, 14, and his brother, Austin Jackson, 12, who were killed on Oct. 24. Donald Jackson Jr., 40, has since been charged with capital murder in their deaths.
“Austin and Logan were suddenly and violently taken away from us,” Pastor William Mcevoy said Monday morning as he presided over the boys’ funeral Mass at St. Francis de Sales church in Lansing. “We’re all shocked. We’re all dismayed.”
He splashed holy water over their caskets, as loved ones dressed in black draped white fabric over each wooden box during the service, which was live-streamed on YouTube.
According to their obituaries, Logan was an eight grader and Austin was a seventh grader at Lansing Middle School.
The boys were found dead at their father’s home at 14970 Hillside Road in rural Leavenworth after someone went looking for them when one of the boys didn’t show up for a soccer game.
Mcevoy, who grew up in Leavenworth, shared memories of Austin and Logan with Monday’s mourners.
“I don’t know if the quietness and peacefulness of heaven is ready for these two boys,” Mcevoy said.
He described the boys as “a handful,” recalling their involvement in a religious education programs a few summers earlier.
“They were definitely remembered by their teachers,” he said with a chuckle.
Austin, the youngest, was an athlete and “a feared scoring threat” who liked soccer best, Mcevoy said.
Off the field Austin loved animals and dreamed of becoming a National Park Service ranger, the pastor said. Austin cared for his dog Maggie and kept a slew of amphibians in his room.
“Austin was a walking turtle encyclopedia,” Mcevoy said. “For all intents and purposes he was a herpetologist.”
While he said Austin had a “mischievous smile,” his older brother had a smile “like a ray of sunshine,” Mcevoy said.
He described Logan as extremely intelligent and opinionated, a great debater in the works. But he also had a heart for those he loved.
“Logan very much loved taking care of his sisters and he was especially caring and attentive to them when they were babies,” Mcevoy said.
The boys, who liked to play video games and ride four-wheelers, became closer over recent years, their pastor said. Logan, who was more reserved, looked out for Austin, who Mcevoy said never met a stranger.
“They were indeed, as the obituary put it, friends, partners and great adventurers, teammates and brothers, and they go to heaven together,” he said.
Meanwhile, Mcevoy said, their living kin are left behind trying to make sense of their absence.
Their deaths were “so unthinkable and so unfathomable,” “shattering” their loved ones’ sense of security, he said.
The same day Austin and Logan were found dead, Amber Alerts were issued in multiple states for two of the boys’ sisters, who are 7 and 3.
Investigators said they believed Donald Jackson Jr. abducted them, though he has not been charged with such a crime.
Hours after the girls’ disappearance, Jackson was arrested by officers in Beckham County, Oklahoma. The girls, his daughters, were in the car with him.
They have since been taken back to their mother, Tara Jackson, who was in the middle of divorce proceedings with Donald Jackson.
At a news conference last week, Leavenworth County Attorney Todd Thompson released few details about the accusations against Jackson, saying he did not want to taint a potential jury. He declined to say, among other things, how the boys were killed.
“Can we even today, even after all this, still believe (in God)?” Mcevoy asked during Monday’s service as he quoted the Gospel. “I sure hope and pray so.”
As the funeral Mass concluded, Mcevoy waved incense across the caskets, filling the air with a fragrant perfume.
A woman led the congregation in singing “Let There be Peace on Earth” as the boys’ caskets were rolled down the aisle, followed closely by family.
“With God as our father, brothers all are we,” the crowd sang as the funeral concluded. “Let me walk with my brother in perfect harmony.”
This story was originally published November 2, 2020 at 2:42 PM.
