• April 20, 2023

Fresno County, CA — April 19, 2023, a man was killed due to an accident involving a service truck around 9:30 a.m. on Manning Avenue.

Officials with the California Highway Patrol say that the crash happened at the intersection of Manning Avenue and James Road. Their statements say that a pickup truck was crossing the intersection when a service truck allegedly ran a stop sign. As a result, the vehicles collided.

A passenger in the pickup, identified in the news only as a man in his 40s, sustained fatal injuries. The driver of the pickup, also unidentified, was taken to a hospital. No other injuries were confirmed. At this time, authorities have not confirmed any charges or citations.

If the claims here are true, one would think charges will be coming shortly. Very rarely does a vehicle go through a stop sign without the driver doing something wrong. While it's worth considering those unlikely possibilities, it's also important to know the reason a mistake happened if that's ultimately the story here.

For example, I had a situation not long ago involving a work truck driver texting and driving leading up to a serious crash. It was obvious they screwed up, but further investigations revealed a more serious situation than just one reckless driver. It turned out the driver was texting his supervisor, who essentially hounded drivers constantly and then got mad if they took too long to respond. It didn't matter if the drivers were trying to wait for it to be safe to respond. All that mattered to the supervisor was getting his way, and people were seriously hurt as a result.

Maybe nothing like that happened here, but that's something victims and families deserve to know is getting attention. Was this just some reckless individual? Was it the result of a negligent business that is putting others at risk? Was it some one-in-a-million, freak occurrence that couldn't be avoided? At the end of the day, it's up to the evidence to answer that question.

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