UPDATE: Matthew Deans pleaded guilty to two involuntary manslaughter charges Wednesday morning. Deans will serve one to three years in prison and will also have three years of probation upon release, according to several reports.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Pender County Grand Jury has indicted the man involved in an accident that killed a Charlotte church leader’s toddler and newborn son.
According to reports, Matthew Deans, 29, was indicted for two counts of Involuntary Manslaughter in the deaths of Dobbs and Reed Eddings.
Officials say Deans will appear in Pender County Superior Court on Wednesday, September 2nd.
Gentry Eddings is a worship leader at Forest Hill Church in Ballantyne. The pastor was driving from Topsail, North Carolina, to Charlotte with his wife and son when the incident occurred.
Eight months pregnant, Hadley Eddings, and her two-year-old, Dobbs, were in one car, while Gentry was in another car behind them at a stoplight on Highway 17 in Hampstead. That is when Highway Patrol says Deans did not slow down at the light and hit Gentry’s car.
Investigators say that caused a chain reaction that sent the mother to the hospital for an emergency delivery of her unborn child. The family’s two-year-old didn’t make it.
