Criminal charges are being filed against the owner of a bus service involved in a May hotel shuttle accident.
Police said Tuesday that they are charging Mike Toye, the owner of MTI Limos and Shuttles, because the driver lacks the proper license for operating the shuttle bus.
“Mr. Toye will be charged with allowing a person to drive an unsafe vehicle,” College Park police Sgt. Keith Stanley said.
The shuttle bus collided with a tractor-trailer that was making a U-turn on Loop Road on May 24. The driver of the shuttle, Yolanda Latise Boles, and her 16 passengers were injured in the collision May 24.
A transportation safety professional hired by MTI to independently investigate the wreck also has disputed the findings of a state investigation into the collision.
Lt. Pete McCaleb of the Public Safety Department’s division of carrier compliance, said the shuttle “was not in tip-top condition” at the time of the accident, lacking brake fluid and riding on tires with the metal belts showing through the outer rubber.
“Had we seen this particular vehicle … (and) it was in the condition it was in, it would’ve been out of service,” McCaleb said.
But John Page, who is trained in accident reconstruction, challenged McCaleb’s assessment when he was reached by phone Monday.
“It appears that the young lady drives two-footed,” Page told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “In the midst of the panic, she pressed the gas and the brakes at the same time. That overpowers the rear wheel brake system.”
Page is still waiting to get access to the damaged bus.
Charges were announced Monday against Boles and Mario Cochran, the driver of the tractor-trailer owned by USA Truck. Neither Boles nor Cochran could be reached for comment.
Boles is charged with operating a commercial vehicle with improper license, as well as three counts of serious injury by vehicle, operating a vehicle with improper tires and operating an unsafe vehicle. Speeding charges are also pending against Boles, whom investigators determined was exceeding the 45 mph speed limit at the time of the wreck.
Cochran, the driver of the USA Truck tractor-trailer, was charged with making an improper left turn for initiating that U-turn from the right lane, and with three counts of serious injury by vehicle. Police on Tuesday changed Cochran’s first charge to improper U-turn.
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