Rock-throwing incident in Akron leaves Sharon Budd's family in pain

Tuesday's rock-throwing incident in Akron hits home for the family of Sharon Budd, a Stark County woman who was seriously injured a decade ago after four teenagers were accused of throwing rocks at her car while she and her family were driving on a car driving on the Pennsylvania highway.

“The second that rock was thrown, several, several dozen people were affected,” Rhonda Williams, Budd's sister-in-law, said in an interview with 3News on Wednesday. “Dozens.”

Williams says she will never forget the summer of 2014.

“Sharon was an amazing mother, wife, teacher and she loved them all,” Williams said. “She loved doing what she did and that’s all over now.”

Budd, a mother of four, was driving on Interstate 80 into New York City to see a Broadway show with her husband, Randy, and their then-teenage daughter, Kaylee. A few hours into their journey, a rock was thrown at their car near the Gray Hill Road overpass in Union County, Pennsylvania, causing Budd to suffer life-threatening injuries.

“If you throw a rock, it’s a weapon,” Williams lamented. “They use these weapons to hurt people, and even though it's not a weapon, it's still a rock used as a weapon.”

Four teenagers either pleaded guilty or pleaded no contest to charges related to the incident. All were sentenced to less than five years in prison, which Budd's family said left them devastated.

“They literally destroyed my entire family and my future in like a second,” James Budd, Sharon's son, told 3News sister station WNEP in July.

Sharon's husband, Randy, cared for her for two years after she was injured, but he later died by suicide. Relatives say he felt guilty about his wife's new reality.

“I lost my brother, these kids lost their father, and it was all because of that split-second decision,” Williams said.

As for Sharon, who has undergone 13 surgeries in the last decade and now lives in assisted living, she says the incident has become a fading memory.

“I have little glimpses of what happened,” she told WNEP, “but not even for a minute.”

However, the incident left a lasting impact on the rest of her family.

“It changes lives and it ruins lives,” Williams noted. “Someone has to get a handle on this because it keeps happening.”

This week's ordeal on I-76 in Akron thankfully left no one seriously injured, although a woman had to have shards of glass washed out of her eye after her boyfriend's windshield was shattered. Williams tells us that Budd is doing well, although he has experienced a few minor setbacks this year.