SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) A decision on whether to bring criminal charges in a fiery interstate crash that killed five Georgia nursing students could take months as investigators work to piece together details of the collision, authorities said Thursday.
The deadly, chain-reaction crash early Wednesday on Interstate 16 involved six vehicles. The Georgia State Patrol suspects it began with a tractor-trailer that failed to slow down and smashed into stop-and-go traffic that had backed up from an earlier, unrelated wreck. The big truck plowed into two passenger vehicles carrying nursing students from Georgia Southern University to their clinical training shift at a Savannah hospital, the State Patrol said. Five of the students died and two others were injured.
The top prosecutor for Bryan County, where the crash occurred about 20 miles west of Savannah, said Thursday he'll base his decision on whether to seek criminal charges on the findings of State Patrol investigators who specialize in reconstructing fatal wrecks.
``The reconstruction report will take several months,'' said Sgt. 1st Class Chris Nease, commander of the State Patrol post investigating the I-16 crash. ``They do an extremely thorough investigation on prosecutable fatalities and large-scale crashes.''
Why so long? Nease has three investigators assigned to reconstruct fatal crashes in a 15-county region of southeast Georgia. It's painstaking work that involves interviewing numerous witnesses, analyzing wreckage and damaged vehicles for physical clues and ordering lab tests to screen multiple drivers for drugs and alcohol.
Once the crash is reconstructed, investigators and prosecutors have to decide on whether the evidence supports charging anyone involved with a crime and if so, should it be a felony or a misdemeanor? Sometimes that's obvious, such as when tests show a driver is intoxicated. In other cases it can be a tough call because drivers in fatal crashes rarely set out to hurt anybody.
``These types of cases are more complicated, and to do it in a correct fashion can take a while,'' said Tom Durden, district attorney for the Atlantic Judicial Circuit that includes Bryan County.
The Georgia State Patrol said its nine crash reconstruction teams statewide handled 373 cases last year. The agency said most investigations lasted three months or less, though some took up to six months.
In one high-profile case last year, State Patrol investigators took 10 months to complete their report on a crash in coastal Brunswick in which prosecutors charged a driver with murder, saying he intentionally rammed his pickup truck into a couple's car.
The interstate crash Wednesday killed Emily E. Clark, 20, of Powder Springs, Morgan J. Bass, 20, of Leesburg, Abbie L. Deloach, 21, of Savannah, Catherine M. Pittman, 21, of Alpharetta and Caitlyn N. Baggett, 21, of Millen. Georgia Southern officials said all were nursing students in their junior year.
The morning of the crash they were headed to St. Joseph's Hospital in Savannah, where they were wrapping up clinical training for the school year.
``We lost our friends on the way to do what they wanted to do,'' Holley Allen, a fellow Georgia Southern nursing student who knew the victims, told WTOC-TV.
Georgia Southern held a candlelight vigil at its Statesboro campus Thursday night. Meanwhile, Gov. Nathan Deal ordered flags at state buildings and parks to be lowered to half-staff Friday in honor of the women who died.
Tuesday
February 11th, 2025
2:17PM
