Second wrongful death lawsuit filed in Interstate 70 crash that killed 2
Matthew Sanders
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
A second wrongful death lawsuit against the truck driver in a crash that killed two women on Interstate 70 in Columbia was filed Thursday.
The lawsuit, filed by three of Melvina Colin’s children, seeks damages from the driver, Walter Montejo, and four companies connected to the load he was carrying when he crashed into a U-Haul carrying Colin and Cindy Helms, 54, of Rockwood, Tennessee, in August 2024.
Helms was driving the U-Haul.
Montejo’s tractor-trailer drove over the concrete median barrier on I-70 and hit the U-Haul head-on. Colin, 84, of Broomfield, Colorado, was pronounced dead at the scene.
Montejo, a citizen of El Salvador in the United States on a work visa, pleaded guilty last month to two counts of involuntary manslaughter and a count of fourth-degree assault. He faces a maximum of four years in prison and will be sentenced Nov. 24.
The lawsuit claims that Montejo was driving aggressively, on too little rest, and speeding when the crash happened. The plaintiffs claim his employers, FDH Trucking and JL Transportation LLC, failed to perform a proper background check when hiring Montejo. The company also should have known Montejo had no valid driver’s license.
Bluebird Logistics and Bluebird Compositing, which owned the trailer, were also named in the lawsuit.
Rudolph Colin, a son of Melvina Colin, and Jacob Helms, a son of Cindy Helms, filed a similar lawsuit in May.