Driver on Cocaine Charged in Connection with Deadly School Bus Crash

 

BUDA, TX - The driver of the concrete pumper truck that swerved into the wrong lane and crashed into a Hays CISD school has been charged with criminally negligent homicide, according to court documents.

Court documents revealed that 42-year-old Jerry Hernandez allegedly admitted to drug use the night before and the morning of the crash. Hernandez had used cocaine and was driving on just three hours of sleep the day his truck crashed into the bus.

The bus carrying a group of pre-K students from Tom Green Elementary on March 22 lost two of its passengers. 

The crash killed 5-year-old student Ulises Rodriguez Montoya and 33-year-old Ryan Wallace, a Ph.D. student at the University of Texas at Austin. Dozens of others were also injured.

Hernandez told the Texas Department of Public Safety that he swerved his truck to avoid a vehicle that broke suddenly in front of him, but footage of the crash released by Hays CISD tells a different story.

Video of the collision shows the driver of the school bus trying to avoid the crash by partially moving onto the shoulder before it was hit.

Hernandez also refused to provide a blood sample for analysis. 

GoFundMe pages have been set up to support the families of the deceased and the injured. 

GoFundMe for 5-year-old Ulises Rodriguez Montoya can be found here: https://gofund.me/026b0f7e

GoFundMe for Ryan Wallace can be found here: https://gofund.me/8b75f962

GoFundMe for the Tom Green Elementary Hornets: https://gofund.me/000c1be6

Click here to watch the video.

Subscribe to the LIVE! Daily

The LIVE! Daily is the "newspaper to your email" for San Angelo. Each content-packed edition has weather, the popular Top of the Email opinion and rumor mill column, news around the state of Texas, news around west Texas, the latest news stories from San Angelo LIVE!, events, and the most recent obituaries. The bottom of the email contains the most recent rants and comments. The LIVE! daily is emailed 5 days per week. On Sundays, subscribers receive the West Texas Real Estate LIVE! email.

Required

Most Recent Videos

Post a comment to this article here:

X Close