Plea Changed in I-5 Deaths of 3 Tourists : Trucker’s ‘No Contest’ Comes on Eve of Trial

A truck driver has pleaded no contest to vehicular manslaughter for the deaths last September of three Dutch tourists whose vans he rear ended on Interstate 5 just south of the U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint at San Onofre.

The victims were part of a 23-member musical tour group from The Netherlands. They were heading back to their Orange County motel after spending the day at San Diego’s Sea World.

The crash injured 19 others and brought northbound traffic on I-5 to a three-hour standstill.

Neil Adams, 33, of San Jose, changed his plea from innocent in a plea bargain Monday, when his trial was scheduled to get under way with jury selection in Vista Superior Court.

Possible Sentence

Adams will be sentenced June 14, and faces a maximum five-year, four-month prison term and a fine of $30,000, San Diego County Deputy Dist. Atty. Walt Donovan said.

In exchange for his plea of no contest for each of three counts of vehicular manslaughter, the district attorney’s office dropped charges that Adams was in possession of methamphetamine at the time of the crash. Still, that fact will be made known to the sentencing judge, Donovan said.

Adams remains free on $32,000 bail.

Prosecutors had sought to charge Adams with the more serious charge of vehicular manslaughter through gross negli gence, but that charge was dropped at Adams’ preliminary hearing when another truck driver testified that Adams showed no signs of careless driving for the 18 to 20 miles before Adams approached the U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint at San Onofre.

Witnesses testified at Adams’ preliminary hearing in January that Adams was driving his tractor-trailer rig in the right-hand lane as he approached the Border Patrol checkpoint.

Had he remained in that lane, witnesses said, Adams would have had no traffic ahead of him and would have been diverted off the freeway for the California Highway Patrol weigh station.

But instead, witnesses said, Adams inexplicably crossed into the next lane to his left, and failed to slow as traffic in front of him braked for the checkpoint.

Smashed Into Van

Adams plowed into a Ford passenger van that was carrying half of the Dutch group. The van was going about 10 m.p.h.

At impact, that van crushed into a second van carrying the other members of the group.

Two passengers in the first van--Wonny Ooft, 28, and Wiellem Gannsen, 35--died at the scene of broken necks. Jof Richares, 48, a passenger in the second van, died a day later after he suffered a heart attack.

An attorney representing some of the injured tourists and the survivors of the victims later filed a $30-million civil lawsuit against Adams and the truck company which hired him.

While Adams’ plea of no contest carries the same weight as a guilty plea in criminal court, it is not an admission of liability in a civil proceeding.

Adams, who was not injured in the crash, was given a field sobriety test at the scene by a CHP officer and arrested on suspicion of drunk driving. A blood test later showed his blood alcohol content at 0.03--below the 0.10 standard for being legally drunk--but it also showed levels of methamphetamine in his blood.

Investigators later found 1.3 grams of methamphetamine in his truck cab.

Adams had admitted to CHP officers at the scene that he had two or three beers several hours before the crash.