Life hadn’t always been easy for him. But Tre Lovell Shelton was a happy 13-year-old who knew he was loved, his uncle said.
And Tre was also a thrill-seeker who liked to push himself to the limit. That's what he was doing when he crashed his Honda dirtbike Wednesday afternoon and died, Logan Diamond, Tre's uncle, said Thursday night.
“He knew he wasn’t supposed to be on it,” Diamond said.
An eighth grader at Yeager Middle School, Tre was driving a Honda motorcycle northbound on Yeager Road when he struck a curb, left the roadway and hit a pole, according to the Georgia State Patrol. He was ejected from the bike and died after being transported to the hospital.
At the time of his death, Tre’s mother and stepfather were in jail, and he was living with a family friend, Diamond said. But his uncle and aunt often checked in on him. The two last talked Wednesday morning.
“I asked to make sure he was eating right,” Diamond said. “And I told him I loved him.”
Tre was about a half-mile from home when he crashed, Diamond said.
“This happened out of nowhere and no one was expecting it,” he said.
Funeral arrangements have not yet been finalized.
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