Oregon driver who hit softball bus, killing Nampa college student, is sentenced
The man who killed two people — including a student from Nampa — when he crashed into a college softball team’s bus will serve a lengthy prison sentence.
Jonathan Dowdy, 32, of Coos Bay, Oregon, was driving a truck while drunk on Oregon Highway 42 in Coos County when he crossed the center line into the eastbound lane of traffic last April, according to an Oregon State Police news release. Dowdy hit a bus that was driven by 46-year-old Umpqua Community College softball coach Jami Strinz, of Roseburg, Oregon, and carried nine members of the softball team, according to the release.
The crash killed Strinz and Kiley Jones, 19, of Nampa, according to police. The other eight people on the bus “suffered moderate to serious injuries and were provided emergency medical services,” police said.
Dowdy pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree manslaughter for the deaths of Jones and Strinz, three counts of third-degree assault for three players who incurred serious injuries in the crash, five counts of fourth-degree assault, driving with a suspended license and driving under the influence of intoxicants, according to Coos County sentencing records.
Coos County Judge Andrew Combs sentenced Dowdy in September to more than 20 years in prison, including 12.5 years for the deaths of the two women.
He also ordered Dowdy in December to pay about $360,000 in restitution.
Jones graduated from Columbia High School in Nampa in 2024 before heading to Umpqua Community College that fall as a freshman, and played first base on the Umpqua softball team, according to a college player spotlight.
“Although I forgive him because I don’t want to live in bitterness and anger, I don’t excuse his bad behavior and his bad choice,” Nichole Mahoney, Jones’ mother and a Nampa resident, told The Associated Press.
Columbia High School announced it was launching the Kiley Jones Memorial Scholarship to honor “the legacy of Kiley and continue to celebrate all of the awesomeness that she was.” The scholarship will go to a female student-athlete who participates in three sports, is a member of the school’s leadership group, a team captain and maintains a minimum 3.0 GPA, according to a website created by Columbia High.
