Michigan man and son, 20, laid to rest after losing battle to coronavirus within 3-day span

April 13, 2020

Two of Michigan’s nearly 1,400 coronavirus deaths were a 20-year-old man and his father who died within a three-day span.

The father, 59-year-old Freddie Lee Brown Jr., a retiree, died on March 26. The son Freddie Lee Brown III, a college student, died March 29.

Sandy Brown held a small visitation Friday for her husband and son with mourners standing outside their cars, adhering to social distancing, according to reports.

“My two men are gone. I am standing here in the strength of the Lord, not no strength of my own," Brown said, as WWMT-TV reported.

She gave her men a purple teddy bear and dressed them in their Sunday best, the station reported. A Michigan State jersey draped the casket of her son, a football fanatic.

Brown’s husband, who had a kidney transplant, fell ill and then went to the hospital after having trouble breathing, the Detroit News reported Friday. He tested positive for COVID-19 and wound up on a ventilator, the report said.

The day after his death, Brown’s son, who had asthma, got sick. His condition reportedly improved but then worsened before he died.

“There’s not even a word created to describe my pain. It’s unimaginable,” Sandy Brown said.

“In three days, I lost my husband and son to an ugly plague. I watched my son go from completely well and whole and happy to being gone in three days."