Ron "Koot" Wilkison Jr., 42.

By David Burcham
CNHI News Service

NEW CASTLE, Pa. — Ron “Koot” Wilkison Jr. is finally coming home, but not the way his mother had hoped and prayed.

Sheryl Wilkison had been waging a prolonged legal fight to bring her comatose adult son back to his hometown in western Pennsylvania so he could be surrounded by friends and family.

But Ron Wilkison, 42, died Tuesday in a suburban St. Louis, Mo., convalescent home, 12 years after a traffic accident near that city left him in a vegetative state.

While working for a delivery company, he apparently did not see a stop sign at the bottom of a hill and skidded onto a four-lane highway into the path of a tractor-trailer on Sept. 30, 1999.

Married for just over a year and the father of an infant girl at the time, Wilkison became a ward of the state of Missouri. His wife, Christy, was appointed his guardian.

After his wife filed for divorce in 2002 and surrendered her guardianship, Mrs. Wilkison began her quest.

But local courts had no jurisdiction because her son was no longer a resident of Pennsylvania. A Missouri court appointed a public administrator as his guardian.

Mrs. Wilkison said it was only recently it appeared she would be allowed to bring her son home and place him in an adult care facility in New Castle.

Then she got a call that he was not doing well.

“I got the last seat on the last fight to St. Louis,” said Mrs. Wilkison, who had made more than 100 trips there over the years to be with her son.

She said she arrived at his bedside to see him open his eyes for about a minute.

“I was so exuberant,” she said. Then, she added, he closed his eyes for good. His death was attributed to pneumonia.

“I didn’t want him to die alone,” Mrs. Wilkison said. “I was holding him when he went. It’s over.”
---
David Burcham is a reporter for the New Castle, Pa., News. Contact him at dburcham@ncnewsonline.com.