A bus driver accused of causing a crash that killed five people and injured dozens of others on Interstate 95 in Stafford County, Virginia, in May appeared in court for the first time Wednesday morning.
Jing Dong, 48, of Staten Island, New York, was pushed into two separate courtrooms in a wheelchair where he faced five counts of involuntary manslaughter and one misdemeanor count of reckless driving.
His attorney, Thad Furlong, said he is in immense pain and had several internal surgeries following the overnight crash on May 29 near Marine Corps Base Quantico.
鈥淗e has to focus sometimes to answer our questions. He’s still got some residual concussion and things going on up there, but he is competent at this time to participate in the proceedings,鈥� Furlong said.
A Mandarin interpreter helped with the proceedings, but Furlong said Dong does speak 鈥渓imited English.鈥� The interpreter is present to make things faster and because his client preferred to speak in his native tongue.
Dong was born in China and his English language proficiency has been called into question by Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. Prosecutors would not comment what evidence they had gathered in that aspect of the investigation.
The court proceedings established an arraignment date in circuit court for June 22 where he will enter a plea. Another preliminary hearing was set for Aug. 28 in General District Court.
Commonwealth attorney Eric Olsen said the charges will likely be merged in circuit court, especially if the case goes to trial.
Police have said Dong failed to slow down the coach bus when approaching a work zone in the southbound lanes of I-95. The bus struck a Chevrolet Suburban, causing a chain-reaction collision with multiple vehicles.
Furlong said that Dong was devastated when he woke up in the hospital and learned of the five deaths in the crash.
鈥淲hen he woke up in the hospital and was informed that people lost their lives in this accident. He was devastated by that. He’s expressed how sorry he is about this incident many times to us,鈥� Furlong said. 鈥淚t’s a genuine remorse. He wished it had never happened.鈥�
When asked if Dong knows what caused this crash and if he had a medical episode or fell asleep, Furlong said, 鈥淲e have had discussions on the defense team with him about his memory and what he recalls. 鈥� I can tell you that he has communicated with us what he remembers, and we are going to match that against the evidence that the commonwealth attorney gave us today to see if they match up.鈥�
The commonwealth鈥檚 attorney handed over video evidence and around 2,000 photos.
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