MARION, Ind. – The sun had just set on a cool April day when truck driver Robert F. Spencer phoned his sister in Michigan.
He was in Indiana, and, as authorities would later discover, had been driving his rig for hours longer than federal law allows.
With the truck’s windows down and its air conditioner on maximum, Spencer suddenly stopped talking. Minutes passed. Then, still listening to the phone line, his sister Nicole heard a bang.
Spencer, 37, of Canton Township, Mich., near Detroit, was arrested Friday, charged with five counts of reckless homicide for the April 26 crash that killed four students and a staff member from Taylor University and injured four others.
Details of the moments leading up to and following the crash on Interstate 69 began to emerge Friday in court documents.
Prosecutors said Spencer never hit the brakes to slow his speeding truck until it crossed a median and slammed into the university’s van.
After the accident, the trucker seemed confused. Witnesses reported that Spencer had fallen asleep at the wheel.
“Did I hit something? What happened? Who did this?” Spencer asked, according to court documents.
The crash drew attention when two families discovered one of the victims had been misidentified as a survivor. The two young women were similar in appearance, and the family of the one who died had kept vigil for five weeks at the bedside of the survivor, believing she was their daughter.
“We believe the evidence uncovered showed Mr. Spencer acted recklessly when the crash occurred,” Grant County Prosecutor James Luttrull Jr. said Friday. “It’s a terrible human tragedy and a terrible human story.”
Spencer was being held in Michigan and would be given the opportunity for an extradition hearing. If he waives his right to the hearing, he would be picked up by Indiana authorities, Canton Township police Sgt. Mark Schultz said.
A judge in Indiana set bail at $135,000. It was unclear whether Spencer had an attorney.
A police investigation showed Spencer had driven at least nine hours more than allowed under federal rules and had falsely completed a log book showing his driving time the day of the accident.
He also faces felony counts for criminal recklessness causing serious bodily injury for the accident midway between Fort Wayne and Indianapolis.
The Michigan secretary of state’s office, which regulates drivers in that state, cautioned Spencer last August after he had accumulated five infraction points against his license in two years.
After the crash, authorities said Taylor student Whitney Cerak had been killed.
It wasn’t until late May that Cerak’s parents learned their daughter had been misidentified and was recovering from in a Michigan hospital. Fellow student Laura VanRyn, 22, of Caledonia, Mich., was incorrectly thought to have survived the accident.
Cerak, 19, of Gaylord, Mich., was in a coma-like state for several weeks after the crash but has largely recovered.
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