Saint Joseph,LA : Bus driver in fatal I-10 crash found guilty on January, Thursday 11th 2018

A St. John the Baptist Parish jury found bus driver Denis Amaya-Rodriguez guilty Thursday (Jan. 11) of three counts of negligent homicide after deliberating for about two hours. The charge carries a penalty of up to five years in prison with or without hard labor.

Fortieth Judicial District Judge Sterling Snowdy, who presided over the case, will formally sentence Rodriguez at a later date.

The jury composed of four women and two men heard testimony starting Tuesday in Edgard. That testimony included a motorist who told jurors she saw the bus swerving in and out of traffic and feared it would crash after passing her up.

Authorities say Amaya-Rodriguez was driving a bus with more than 30 passengers to Baton Rouge when he crashed the morning of August 28, 2016 into several cars stopped on the I-10 overpass from an earlier accident. The passengers were headed to the city to work on flood-damaged buildings.

The crash resulted in the deaths of a LaPlace firefighter who was responding to the earlier accident and two Mississippi men who were riding in one of the vehicles struck by the bus.

Amaya-Rodriguez' court appointed attorney Shannon Battiste argued that the brakes on the bus failed, causing the accident. His lone witness, bus passenger Vickie Fuentes of Terrytown testified that she saw the driver messing with something that she assumed was the emergency brakes prior to the crash.

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Bus driver in fatal I-10 crash found guilty