A truck driver who caused a fatal crash on Interstate 5 in Oregon, killing seven farmworkers in a parked van, was sentenced to nearly 50 years in prison on Tuesday.
Marion County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Wren sentenced Lincoln Smith to 48 years and 3 months, according to Oregon Public Broadcasting.
He was convicted in February on seven counts of second-degree manslaughter, three counts of assault, and reckless driving. Jurors acquitted the 54-year-old Californian of driving under the influence of intoxicants.
Testifying at trial, Smith said the effects of drugs he took the night before the crash had worn off and he nodded off at the wheel. Traces of methamphetamine, fentanyl, and morphine were found in his blood after the crash.
The crash, one of Oregon’s deadliest, occurred in May 2023. Smith’s semitruck collided with a van carrying 11 farmworkers parked on the side of I-5 near Albany, in the agricultural Willamette Valley.
The victims were identified as Juan Carlos Leyva-Carrillo, 37; Gabriel Juarez-Tovilla, 58; Alejandra Espinoza-Carpio, 39; Eduardo Lopez-Lopez, 31; Luis Enrique Gomez-Reyes, 30; Alejandro Jimenez-Hernandez, 36; and Josue Garcia-Garcia, 30.
Smith apologized in court, stating that if he could trade his life for any of the victims’, he would, KGW-TV reported.
Albany is about 70 miles (110 kilometers) south of Portland. I-5 is the primary north-south interstate on the West Coast.
