The driver of a concrete truck that hit a school bus in Texas has admitted using cocaine and marijuana in the 24 hours before the crash.
Ulises Rodriguez Montoya, 5, a pre-K student at Tom Green Elementary School who was on the bus, and Ryan Wallace, 33, a postgraduate student at the University of Texas who was driving a vehicle behind the bus, were killed in the accident, according to USA Today.
Thirty-two people went to local hospitals, Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services reported.
A YouTube video shows one perspective of the crash.
https://youtu.be/UyOIcSG0qa4?si=uQ1s6No4TeWZ6uil
Hernandez said he smoked marijuana around 10 p.m. on March 21 and consumed cocaine at about 1 a.m. on March 22, the day of the crash. The driver also said he had about three hours of sleep the night before the crash, according to KXAN-TV.
According to court documents, Hernandez said he went into the bus’s lane because an SUV ahead of him braked suddenly. The truck hit a bus carrying 44 pre-K students from Tom Green Elementary School along with 11 adults. They had been returning from the Capital of Texas Zoo in Bastrop County.
The impact caused the bus to roll over.
💔TEXAS NEWS: Officials in Hays County have named the 5-year-old boy who was killed in a collision involving a school bus and concrete truck on Friday afternoon.
STORY: https://t.co/xK6uPdCOZw pic.twitter.com/mYbaYDYZrj
— 🚨 Rusty Surette 🚨 (@KBTXRusty) March 26, 2024
The affidavit said the video shows no vehicles ahead of Hernandez and notes that he could have swerved to the right along State Highway 21 if necessary.
The Texas Department of Public Safety said its crash reconstruction team was investigating the incident.
The bus did not have seat belts, the Hays School District said, noting that most other buses have seat belts.
KXAN reported that according to the federal Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse database, Hernandez “had a refusal for a reasonable suspicion test” on Sept. 2, 2020, “which would have warranted he be referred to a Substance Abuse Professional (SAP) for evaluation.”
The affidavit said he should have been “removed from performing safety-sensitive functions” by the company for which he was driving at the time.
BREAKING | The driver of the concrete pumper truck that crashed into a school bus full of pre-K students last week admitted that he only got three hours of sleep the night before, and he consumed cocaine the morning of the collision.https://t.co/8tCISSBLPb
— News 4 San Antonio (@News4SA) March 28, 2024
Follow-up tests on Hernandez were conducted -- one on Dec. 15, 2022, for marijuana, and one on April 11, 2023, for cocaine.
Test results gave him a “prohibited” status with the company he drove for, but the state system listed him as “eligible.”
Court records said that because Hernandez was driving a “concrete pump truck in intrastate commerce,” he was “exempted from the regulations.”
