The talented young actress who brought Jia to life in the “Godzilla” films is being remembered for her courage, authenticity, and powerful representation of the Deaf community. She was only 18, but her impact reached millions.
The heartbreaking video comes hours after Kaylee’s father, Joshua, announced her death. He took to a Facebook livestream where he explained in ASL that he had to fly from Texas to Maryland after Kaylee was involved in a car accident. He noted that Kaylee’s heart stopped en route to the hospital.
“I am taking a flight that I never would like to take,” the caption to the nearly 23-minute video read.
The Frederick County Sheriff’s Office said that on Tuesday at around 2:52 a.m., deputies and crews from the Frederick County Division of Fire and Rescue Services “responded to a fatal single-vehicle collision in the 11400 block of Windsor Road in Ijamsville, Maryland.”
“The preliminary investigation revealed that a 1995 Honda Accord, operated by a 19-year-old Frederick man, traveled off the right side of the two-lane roadway and struck a culvert. Excessive speed is believed to be a contributing factor in the collision,” a media release stated. “In addition to the driver, two passengers were in the vehicle at the time of the collision. The driver was transported to a local hospital with injuries that are not believed to be life-threatening. One passenger declined medical treatment at the scene.”
The Sheriff’s Department identified the second passenger as Kaylee, who was transported from the scene to a local trauma center where she later died.
The crash remains under investigation.
A GoFundMe has been created to support Kaylee’s family.
“Kaylee Hottle’s family is facing an unimaginable loss after Kaylee tragically passed away in a car accident,” the page reads. “Kaylee was a beloved member of her family and community, and her sudden passing has left her loved ones heartbroken and overwhelmed.”
The page has raised over $28,000, exceeding the page’s target of raising $20,000.
Kaylee comes from an all-deaf family spanning four generations on her father’s side, according to IMDb.
She started her on-camera career appearing in PSAs for the Glide app in 2016 and 2017, due to her fluency in ASL. In 2018, she was featured in “10 Deaf Children: One Powerful Message.”
She famously played Jia in 2021’s “Godzilla Vs. Kong” and 2024’s “Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire.” Kaylee also made appearances in the reboot of “Magnum P.L” in 2021.
