Minnesota semi driver wanted in I-90 fatality

When you drive at 55 or more miles per hour it does not take much to do a major damage to a light assembly. It's just physics.
Think about it. The trucker said he had hit a hawk and the mechanics bought it.
As far as his confession and behavior later, do you know how many people admitted to being Jack the Reaper? They believed it too. The burden of proof is still out there.
He most likely hit and killed the old man but until there is direct evidence he should walk free.
Also, in a case like this what do we as a society get from this trucker getting locked up for years when obviously he did not do it on purpose if he did it. They turned around and looked for the body several times
. Last but not the least how could they miss his body and how could the car from the car wash come in contact with it later on the highway?
There are thousands of people in this country serving time for crimes they did not commit. Being overzealous and making quick judgments is against principles of due justice. I'd give all benefit of doubt in a case like this because I don't understand how years of incarceration will help anybody in this tragedy

 

My only question is if they went back to look and see what happened, why didn't the co-driver get out to look? What didn't he himself call the police and/or the company? From what I read theirs a couple washing evidence off their car and saying a semi hit him first. So did they witness the accident? Next throw in the co-driver who could have had an argument with the alleged, finds this article and decides to blame him to get back at him. For all we know the car could have been the one to strike and kill the man. I mean how did they manage to get body parts on their car but yet the co-driver didnt see a body laying in the road from his story. There's just too many unexplained holes in this story and without being there we can't say for sure that the truck is the one to have killed him.

 

Thats why im not buying the co-drivers story about him screaming that he hit someone. Im sorry but if I was driving teams I would have made him stop and gotten out to see what was around. How do we even know for sure they were even in the area? They could have been and they could have not been, I nor anyone else on here was there at the time so we can't say for sure. All we have from the article is the story of the two in the car and a so called witness who waits for a month to come forward. Maybe he knew they killed the guy and he wanted to high tail it out of there himself. Who knows for sure really? I could be wrong but I myself am not ready to condemn the guy with just the story that we have so far. If evidence comes to light that says he did it without a shadow of a doubt then ill jump on the throw the switch bandwagon.

 

This is one SOB that should hang! Just
another thing to tarnish our profession.

 

We don't know if the mechanics actually "bought" his story of the hawk. The driver also told the Ohio State Police that he hit a deer.
Therefore his credibility is less than zero. But good to see you seem to have abandoned the "hitting the bag of clothes" theory.
I don't believe there was any bag of clothes involved, at all. What 81 yr old man will break down, then burden himself with a bag of clothes out of his vehicle, to walk down the highway in search of help? I highly suspect the "clothes" that Welk saw strewn over the passing lane were actually the remnants of the deceased's body and clothes he was wearing.

Even Trooper Joe Hensley of MT Highway Patrol stated that when he arrived at the scene he observed "the trauma sustained by the deceased was very significant. There were no recognizable remains or identifiable portions of the body at the scene". But I can assure you, the trooper DID know it was a person that was struck.
We also know that the victim had also been struck by the father/daughter in the SUV. Had the father/daughter struck the victim first (highly unlikely) then the victim would have never been at "headlight level" to knock out Welk's headlight on impact.

You ask how the car/SUV could have come in contact with the victim, after Welk saw no body. From the info provided, the car is likely to have been the first vehicle behind Welk's truck, be it 100' behind or 10 miles behind. It's unclear just how far back Welk & his co-driver walked, when they first stopped after impact, but it's said they walked far enough back to find their missing headlight. Quite possible the victim was already struck by the SUV before they even walked back that far.

In any case, it would have been highly unlikely to not observe blood on the roadway or truck. It's against all common sense to think that anyone that would go back to the scene 3 times (each a 15 mile round trip, 45 mile total out of way) if they just had a minor impact with an animal that knocked a headlight out. The fact is they fled the scene without calling the police, OBVIOUSLY knowing he hit someONE, a human being, a living person.


Your last statement tells it all... which I put in bold type. You don't even care if Welk actually did kill this innocent victim. You simply wouldn't want to "punish him" anyway, because you feel that would serve no good purpose, even knowing he did it. That is the most disgusting thing I've heard,, ever. You need to shift your "bleeding heart" to the one that was left dead and bleeding at the scene. And NO,, Welk did not pull a Jack the Ripper style of claiming guilt for public fame or notoriety. Far from it.

 

A few of you say we shouldn't condemn the driver who hit the old guy...but if it were the other way around , I'm pretty sure the people opposing would be up and arms and hell bent to get this man behind bars. If it would have been your grandpa/pops/husband/friend , your telling me you wouldnt want the person who claims to have hit the man and came forward saying so? So because people come forward and say they were Jack the Ripper and werent , we should completely disregard this drivers statement?

 

If you were a prosecutor and used" highly unlikely" in court, it would only mean you assume there is a chance he may not be guilty and an experienced attorney would have a field day.
As far as me sympathizing with the suspect and you finding it disgusting it only means that you already condemned the trucker before the court date.