Grief strikes family at 100 mph

The grieving mother sits at her dining-room table, surrounded by papers: the case report, the investigation checklist, the sobriety test.

Five months after the crash, she still pictures her son lying in the grass that night, dying, his body pinned beneath the silver sports car he had been riding in with four other teenagers.

She wonders if he was cold. She wonders if paramedics did enough. She wonders if her last words to him before he left their house in Federal Way that night were too trite: "Save some pizza for your dad and brother."

In court, Deborah Asrari becomes angry when her son's name, Danny Asrari, is supplanted by the faceless shorthand for the charge now borne by her neighbors' son: vehicular homicide.

"How many seconds does it take to say a victim's name?" Asrari asked.

Today, she will listen for her son's name in Pierce County Superior Court as a judge determines the sentence for Kalani Plunkett, 18, who pleaded guilty May 17 to vehicular homicide in Danny Asrari's death.

Plunkett, who likely faces two to three years in prison, was drunk the night of the crash, driving at speeds of more than 100 miles per hour. "Just stupid," he told police afterward.

The teens in Plunkett's car had been yelling at him to slow down. After the crash, his eyes bloodshot, his body bruised, he told a detective he didn't know what had happened.

According to police reports of what happened around 2:30 a.m. on March 15, Plunkett was on Interstate 5 near Fife, racing north in his new Acura Integra, headed home to Federal Way from a party.

A Seattle police officer driving to work saw him whiz by. He estimated the Acura was going almost 110 mph when Plunkett went into a turn and lost control.

The car careened into a grassy median, ejecting passengers as it rolled repeatedly.

Plunkett, who was not wearing a seat belt, ended up on the freeway shoulder with minor injuries.

Matthew Sillas, 19, also not wearing a seat belt, landed on the grass with cuts and back injuries. Sky Hardesty-Thompson, 17, and Michael Park, 16, both wearing seat belts, remained in the back seat and suffered cuts and bruises.

Danny Asrari, 18, had been riding between them in the back and had no seat belt. He died from injuries after the car rolled on top of him.

Hours later, after the sun had risen, there was a knock on the Asrari family's front door.

Deborah Asrari opened it to find an officer and a clergyman standing somberly in her portico.

"I remember when they told me at the door," Asrari said. "I remember this thought so clearly: Nothing is going to be the same."

Danny Asrari was no angel, both his parents say. He hadn't finished high school. He had fallen in with a bad crowd.

"Danny was a teenager who was struggling," Deborah Asrari said. "Going through that phase - rebelling. We did our best to keep him on track."

They didn't buy him a car. They kept him from getting a driver's license.

"I tried to protect him," his father, Kianoosh Asrari, said. "I tried to keep him away from these kids very hard. But he just loved his friends."

And despite his troubles, Danny was a good son, his parents said. He had a passion for rap music, loved to write lyrics and was seldom without a notepad.

When he was younger, he had a deft touch for soccer. "He danced with that ball," said his father.

In their house, amid the clutter and bustle of daily life, Danny's absence is palpable.

"Much unfinished business between me and him," Kianoosh Asrari lamented.

After the shock and grief over Danny's death came the anger.

When Kalani Plunkett came to the house to apologize, Kianoosh Asrari called him a murderer and told him to leave.

Plunkett had a well-known problem with alcohol, Kianoosh Asrari said. Plunkett's parents, he said, shouldn't have let him have a car.

The toll on the Asrari family has been immeasurable.

"Nothing is like losing a child," Kianoosh Asrari said. He has used up all his sick leave - and then some - trying to cope with the loss.

Their daughter, Shahrzad, 16, had to switch schools because her old school, where her brother also was a student before dropping out, held too many memories, too many questioning peers.

The parents have become fearful, more protective of Shahrzad and their two other children, Maryam, 11, and William, 19.

"We're like nervous wrecks," Deborah Asrari said.

An attorney has told them they should file a civil suit against the Plunketts. But Kianoosh, born in Iran, said he and his family don't see much meaning in the American idea that monetary compensation heals all wounds.

"What does that mean, `Pay us money?' " Deborah Asrari said. The guilt Plunkett's parents must feel is enough, her husband said.

It's almost too much, said Bonni Plunkett, Kalani's mother.

"It's awful," she said. "I think about the Asraris. I can't even speak. I'm just a bundle of nerves. I just feel for them. Their son is dead and my son is alive. Words cannot express the sorrow I feel for them."

To cope with her loss, Deborah Asrari has focused on the criminal charge against Plunkett - on the arraignment, the bail hearing, the plea date. And now the sentencing.

She hopes the judge will be firm.

"Kalani, he needs to be thankful that he's alive," Deborah Asrari said. "For him to heal, he needs to serve that jail time. Let him pay his dues, and then I hope he has a good life. I hope his parents have a good life."

She is struggling to prepare what's called a victim-impact statement for the judge, a responsibility that haunts her with its impossible dictate: Describe the loss. Describe the absence. Describe the value of a child.

"I don't know what to write," she said. "It feels like this is the last thing I'm doing for him as a parent."

Eli Sanders' phone message number is 206-748-5815. His e-mail address is esanders@seattletimes.com.