A truck driver from metro Atlanta is facing vehicular homicide charges after three people died Tuesday evening in a fiery pileup on I-16 in Macon, officials said.
Bond was set at $50,000 on Wednesday for Gerard Lawrence Thompson Sr., 49, of Palmetto, the Macon Telegraph reported. Thompson was booked into jail shortly after the multi-vehicle crash, according to the Bibb County Sheriff’s Office.
Thompson’s tractor-trailer crashed into a pickup truck and a Chevy Cobalt, and both of those drivers died after their vehicles burst into flames, the Telegraph reported.
Marjorie Jones, 81, who was on a church van out of Dublin, died after suffering trauma from the accident, Bibb County Coroner Leon Jones said.
The driver of the Cobalt was identified as 84-year-old Robert Day of Vidalia, who was traveling with the church members but in a separate vehicle.
The body in the pickup, which was burned beyond recognition, has not been identified, the coroner said.
Six people are hospitalized and one person is in a burn center in Augusta with injuries from the crash, according to the Bibb County Sheriff’s Office.
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