Driver gets 110 years for Colorado accident

1099 scab outfits need to keep their steering wheel holders away from these steep Rocky Mountains. Keep your morons East of I 25 please!

 

Don’t think that would do much good..,plenty of places to get in just as much trouble most anywhere

 

Way too much sympathy and too few facts on this thread for my tastes. Let me help you with that. Note originally started this post in a different thread on the same subject that got shut down before I could finish.

The Cuban driver, Rogel Aguilera-Medros, drove for Castellano 03 Trucking out of Houston. Castellano had a horrible safety record. A fleet of 5 trucks racked up 30 safety violations including 10 just for braking issues. They also had a history of hiring drivers who didn't speak English. Specifically, they were cited for, "Driver cannot read or speak the English language sufficiently to respond to official inquiries." and, "Driver must be able to understand highway traffic signs and signals in the English language". To date, it hasn't been disclosed if Rogel was the driver who received these citations. He required a translator when he was interviewed by investigators and at his trial.

See him sailing past the emergency ramp, swerving in all lanes:



See him driving WAAAAAAY too fast before the disaster:



Not only did he have the opportunity to USE A CLEARLY MARKED TRUCK EMERGENCY RAMP. He had opportunities while driving uphill to safely land the truck in a ditch on the left-hand side of the road. Instead, he chose to keep driving. When he got to the bottom of the hill and faced a traffic jam he chose to drive to the right of the fog line. This worked fine until he encountered another truck parked ahead of him. Instead of taking the truck off the road or into a guardrail he chose to drive into 24 cars, killing four. Of course, he blamed the other truck driver:

Rob Corry, Aguilera-Mederos’s attorney, told reporters Thursday that a truck parked on the shoulder of the interstate was to blame.
“He’s a truck driver. He parked his semi on the shoulder of the road, thereby blocking the safe route through this stop-and-go accident and really was the proximate cause of the accident but is not charged with any traffic offense and it’s illegal to park on the shoulder,” Corry said.

He was arrested and put in jail awaiting trial on $400,000 bail. Did he blame his poor choices, inability to speak English or inexperience as a driver? Nah, he claimed he was treated unfairly because of his race. He started a GoFundMe campaign and raised $120,000 to bail out and hired an attorney.

The only innocent victim here (besides the four he killed) is his butt hymen, which will not see the New Year. While the law may let him out eventually, I take comfort knowing that Colorado prisons are full of REAL white supremacists (not the imaginary ones the media seems to think are behind every street sign). I doubt he will survive long enough to live out his sentence.

 

who the hell gave him money?

they should have given the money to the victims.

ok the driver is convicted but the owner and all the decision makers of the company need the same sentence.

 

Justice would do even better to force his boss to do some hard time!

 

I say the same things about a lot of these guys that crash. How many would have been avoided if the dude could have played by the rules that are supposed to prohibit people from getting a cdl in the first place.

 

He made a LOT of poor choices, but that aside I think 110 years is a little harsh. I personally know a couple cold blooded murders that have served, or are serving, less than half that much time. I could see 20 or even 40 years as appropriate... For both the driver and 1 or 2 of the company big wigs. Such a sentence for the driver and 1 or 2 individuals in authority positions at that company would better serve justice IMO.

 

Yep, 40 years for being stupid and another 70 for trying to play the race card to try to make himself a victim……sounds about right.

 

This is apparently a hot topic, and several other posts regarding this news were deleted, and depending where this goes, it too may be cut. I agree with Cattleman, it's too harsh. This kid didn't purposely go out and kill these people, it's an inherent risk stopped at the bottom of a busy interstate at the bottom of a mountain, yes, a truck may come careening out of control. I read, typically, in a case like this, someone on good behavior, serves 38% of the sentence, in this case, 41 years, will be eligible for parole. He'll be an old man. Justice served? I'm sure the families of the people killed think so, was anything mentioned about the company that hired this kid? We today, deal with "after the fact", rather than prevention. Who hires a kid from another country that never drove in mountains, 6 months exoerience, mind you, and throw him in a truck in one of the most challenging areas to drive a truck? There's your problem. Well, on to the next dilemma, this isn't over, and will play out again and again. Sharing the road with 40 ton monsters that the driver may or may not have the ability to control it, is a risk we simply have to take.