Distraught Kay Stevens told today of her anguish at finding her teenage son Michael dying at the side of the road, the victim of a hit-and-run driver.
But Kay says she has taken comfort from knowing his transplanted organs have given life to other people.
The 16-year-old was hit by a truck and lay fighting for his life for two hours beside the Banbury to Overthorpe road.
The former Oxford Mail delivery boy was walking to the hardware store Wickes, in Southam Road, Banbury, where he worked part-time. He was on foot because the lights on his bicycle were not working.
Kay and a friend went out looking for him after his employers rang at 5.10pm on Thursday to say he hadn't arrived at work. He was finally found at about 6.30pm. Kay, of Bull Baulk, Middleton Cheney, told the Oxford Mail: "We must have passed him many times - as did a lot of motorists. Then, by these bushes, I saw this pile and I immediately recognised the blue and red of his uniform.
"I jumped out of the car even before it stopped and I was just praying he would be alive. He had landed in the recovery position and he was still breathing and was warm.
"Like any mother, all I wanted to do was cuddle him. We're so glad we were given the chance to say goodbye to him."
Michael, whose father Kevin works as a computer disaster recovery manager for Unipart in Cowley, was the eldest of five children, with four sisters aged 14, eight, six and 13 months.
He was taken to The Horton Hospital, in Banbury, with head and pelvic injuries, but died on Sunday afternoon. His liver was given to a 32-year-old woman with two days to live, and his heart, lungs and kidneys were also transplanted. Kay said: "He was a very practical person. We had seen a programme about organ donation and the following day he got himself a donor card."
Michael, who went to Chenderit School in the village, had just begun studying for his A-levels and hoped to read medicine.
A police spokesman said: "We believe the vehicle involved was a blue pick-up truck and that there were other vehicles following behind."
Any witnesses should contact Northamptonshire Police on 01604 700700.
A 56-year-old man from Banbury was arrested on Friday and questioned at Daventry police station. He has been released on police bail pending further inquiries.
*Police are renewing an appeal for witnesses to a two-car crash on the A420 between Faringdon and Shrivenham on November 7 in which one person died. Patricia Whitehurst, 47, of Great Coxwell, was killed and four others are still in hospital after the collision between an estate car and a van.
Story date: Tuesday 16 November
Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.
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