Girl Killed, Ta’Quana Crawford, Others Injured in Mail Truck Accident on I-80/94 in Gary, IN
UPDATE (March 10, 2023): Recent reports identified the driver of the car as 27-year-old Ta'Quana Crawford. Crawford and three other occupants were said to have life-threatening injuries following the crash. Additional details about the accident are still under investigation.
Gary, IN -- March 7, 2023, a girl was killed and four people were injured following an accident involving a semi-truck on I-80/94.
Initial details about the crash said that it happened along the eastbound lanes of the interstate approaching Burr Street. Authorities believe that a semi-trailer hauling mail somehow crashed into the back of a car. Doing so, a 6-year-old girl in the car sustained fatal injuries. The driver and three other children were injured.
At this time, additional details about the crash are unavailable. To be rather blunt, there aren't many situations where a truck rear-ends someone without the truck driver making a big mistake, such as speeding or looking at their phone. Could it be that happened here, as well? Of course, I often talk about the importance of letting the evidence speak for itself. I don't make exceptions when it's a truck driver getting the benefit of the doubt.
For all we know, this was an unavoidable tragedy caused by a medical emergency or a mechanical defect. There may have been factors neither driver could control here. But when a young child loses their life in a situation that is far more often than not the result of someone's negligent behavior, does that warrant anything less than immediate and exhaustive investigations into what went wrong here, why it went wrong, and whether or not someone needs to be held accountable for those actions?
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