Updated with additional details and context.
CLARKSVILLE, TN (CLARKSVILLE NOW) – The driver of the Kenwood Middle School bus that crashed head-on into a truck, killing two students and injuring 24 others, has been indicted on traffic charges in Carroll County.
According to a report by WBBJ in nearby Jackson, bus driver Sabrina Ducksworth had been charged with vehicular homicide, along with the two traffic charges. However, the grand jury in Carroll County returned indictments only on failure to exercise due care and driving on roadways laned for traffic. They did not return the homicide charge.
Because the incident happened in Carroll County, the criminal case is being handled there. The prosecutor, District Attorney General J. Neil Thompson, presented the Tennessee Highway Patrol investigation results and, presumably, the National Transportation Safety Board findings, to the grand jury and made the case for an indictment on vehicular homicide. However, the grand jury did not find there was appropriate evidence to support it and returned a “no true bill” on that charge. Grand jury proceedings are not public in Tennessee.
Ducksworth will now face prosecution on the traffic charges. An initial court appearance date has been set for Sept. 25 in Carroll County Circuit Court. No further charges are pending.
The crash and lawsuits
On March 27, the bus was traveling to a STEM-based student competition in Jackson with 24 students and five adults aboard, according to previous reports. Dashcam video from parents driving behind the bus showed it drifting across the double yellow lines before striking an oncoming TDOT dump truck. The bus then collided with a Chevrolet Trailblazer and went off the roadway, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.
Two eighth-grade students were killed – Zoe Davis and Arianna Pearson – and several more were critically injured. The families of the two girls have filed lawsuits against the Clarksville-Montgomery County School System claiming Ducksworth was negligent, fatigued, distracted and failed to exercise “due care in operation of the school bus she was driving.” It also states that CMCSS bears responsibility for hiring, training and supervising Ducksworth.
In June, CMCSS filed a response claiming Ducksworth was not responsible for the crash because she “suffered an unforeseeable sudden loss of consciousness and/or other physical incapacity due to a stroke, cardiovascular failure, or other medical event prior to the collision.”
Lawyers for CMCSS also said cited the Tennessee Governmental Tort Liability Act, saying that under the statute, schools are immune from all claims except negligent operation of a motor vehicle, the families are not entitled to a jury trial, and that damages are capped at $700,000 when combined with other claims arising from the same incident.
| GET YOUR LOCAL MORNING NEWS: Sign up for our free daily email newsletter.