HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — Newly-released video captures the moments leading up to a deadly crash in the Texas Panhandle that killed four young women from the Houston area. The footage is now central to a lawsuit filed against grocery giant H-E-B, a trucking company, and the truck driver involved.
The crash happened on a sunny November day along a wide, open stretch of US 87 just outside Dalhart. Lakeisha Brown, 19, Myunique Johnson, 20, Taylor White, 27, and Breanna Brantley, 30, were traveling home from Oklahoma when their car was struck from behind by an 18-wheeler.
According to the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) crash report, the women had pulled into the outside lane, turned on the hazard lights, and slowed down because of a flat tire. Video taken from another vehicle shows a car safely passing them on the left. Moments later, the 18-wheeler plows into the women’s car at full speed.
Family members say the footage makes it clear the crash was avoidable.
“They never had a chance. They never saw it coming,” Subrina Johnson, Breanna Brantley’s mother, said. “The video clearly shows they never saw it coming.”
Brantley and her friends had traveled to Oklahoma to comfort a grieving friend, Johnson said. The last time she spoke to her daughter was just before the crash.
“The last thing she said was, ‘I love you, and I’m on my way home,'” Johnson said.
Now, Johnson is grieving the loss of her daughter alongside the families of the other victims.
“Not a day goes by that I’m not crying,” she said.
The families have filed a lawsuit against the truck driver, identified in the crash report as Guadalupe Daniel Villarreal, Parkway Transport Inc., Scrappy Trucking, and H-E-B. Villarreal was transporting potatoes for the grocery chain at the time of the crash. The lawsuit alleges negligence, and attorneys for the families believe the driver may have been distracted.
“The video clearly shows another car was able to get out of the way, but the 18-wheeler was not,” attorney Keith Bakker of NMW Law Firm said.
The DPS report states that the truck driver failed to control his speed. Online records show Villarreal has not been criminally charged, though the crash is being investigated as “criminally negligent homicide,” according to the report.
In a statement, H-E-B said the crash involved a third-party vendor driver, not an H-E-B employee. The company added that it and the contractor are fully cooperating with the investigation.
For Johnson, the loss was especially painful during the holidays. She says Christmas was quieter this year without Breanna’s laughter.
The lawsuit, she says, is about accountability.
“The thing is, you want justice for your family,” Johnson said. “They didn’t ask for this. They never saw this coming.”
H-E-B shared the following statement:
“Our H-E-B Family is devastated by this tragic accident, which resulted in the loss of the young women involved. The incident involved a third-party vendor driver, not an H-E-B Partner. H-E-B and the contractor are fully cooperating with the investigation.”
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