Tampa Racing - Rider Down - Brent Marshall Sr. (RIP) Sept 2005

Memorial for Son Claims Father KEYSTONE Nearly six months after his eldest son and namesake died in a motorcycle wreck, William Brent Marshall Sr. decided to stop grieving and concentrate on taking care of his wife, Judy, and 14-year-old son, Branden.

So he called together a group of bikers, friends his age and a bunch of teens who were friends of his son, for a memorial motorcycle run Tuesday evening.

Marshall, known as "Senior" to many of his son's friends, never made it home.

Just after 7 a.m. Wednesday, a passer-by found him dead along Gunn Highway just south of Lutz-Lake Fern Road, the apparent victim of a motorcycle accident.

The irony of the accident stunned his relatives and neighbors and the many friends of his son who considered themselves part of the Marshall extended family. They gathered to grieve at the family's Brentford Drive home in The Fords of Westchase on Wednesday, openly weeping over the loss of the 43-year-old father and 18-year-old son.

"This is our second home," said Tony DeRico, 20. DeRico rode in the memorial run Tuesday night and choked back tears the next day.

About 9 p.m., more than two dozen bikers headed to Linebaugh Avenue and Radcliffe Drive to commemorate a roadside bench and plaque memorializing the younger Marshall, who died near that spot in March.

Marshall thanked all those who attended and talked about his son for 10 minutes. The bikers then headed to the Winner's Grill in Oldsmar for dinner.

Later they rode into Pasco County, where the younger bikers have a clubhouse. They stayed there until after midnight, DeRico said, and stopped for gas at State Road 54 and Gunn Highway.

There, DeRico said, Marshall talked about a problem with his handlebars, that they were loose and dropping, and that if they dropped on a corner the steering could lock. Marshall thought he could make it home on his 1998 Harley-Davidson low-rider.

He sped ahead of the group and soon was out of sight, DeRico said, and that's the last they saw of him, not knowing they passed the fatally injured biker as he lay in a ditch on the east side of Gunn Highway.

"I've known him for five or six years, and he was a very accomplished motorcycle rider," said neighbor Scott Whittington, who accompanied the group on part of the run Tuesday night.

"There were 25 riders last night, and he was in the lead," Whittington said. "He was always the lead because he could handle his motorcycle better than most."

Tuesday night, he said, was the mark of a beginning in Marshall's life. He was going to end his .

"He was closing that chapter on his life and was going to move on," Whittington said.

Having a young family member killed in a wreck is one thing, but having his father killed the same way a few months later was a crushing blow to the family, he said.

"But," Whittington said, "this is a strong family."

Hillsborough County sheriff's deputies called Wednesday's wreck an accident. There was a curve, and Marshall didn't make it.

His eldest son, William Brent Marshall Jr., died less than a mile from home on March 30 when his 2004 Suzuki motorcycle struck a 2004 GMC on Linebaugh Avenue, deputies said.

Branden Marshall, the 14-year-old son and brother of the victims, was stung by the double loss. He hung around with friends and family outside the home Wednesday afternoon but said little.

He pointed to a couple of small dirt bikes parked in the garage and said they were his. He didn't plan on quitting motorcycles.

"I love it," he said before falling quiet again, leaning on a Lexus in the garage with an "In Memory of William Brent Marshall Jr." decal on the rear window.

"He was closing that chapter on his life and was going to move on."

SCOTT WHITTINGTON On his neighbor William Marshall Sr.'s grieving.

...this was in the tampa tribune.