Parents Still Reeling After Man Who Killed Boy Scout Son Found Guilty

Andrew McMorris, 12, was hiking with a group of fellow Boy Scouts in Long Island last year when he was hit and killed by a drunk driver, Thomas Murphy.

Just about a year after losing their Boy Scout son when he was struck by a drunk driver, Alisa and John McMorris have finally seen justice served.

Thomas Murphy was drinking at a golf course in October 2018 before he got behind the wheel and drove off the road and into a Boy Scouts troop that was on a hike. Andrew McMorris, 12, was killed. On Wednesday, Murphy was convicted of aggravated vehicular homicide and vehicular manslaughter.

“This was a completely unnecessary process for us to have to go through,” Alisa McMorris, Andrew’s mother, said tearfully after the verdict. “To make our pain and our loss a thousand times, a million times worse. For what could’ve happened, we trusted the judicial system and it served justice for Andrew and for the entire Troop 161.”

Andrew was a skilled musician. The McMorris family welcomed Inside Edition into their home, where they looked at old family photos and portraits that Andrew had painted. They even presented Andrew's Boy Scouts uniform, a precious memento of their little boy.

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