Are You an Aspiring Trucker? Here's What NOT to do: Posted by DC Cargo Mall on April 07, 2014

V. Valesquez is a an example of a trucker that has managed to kill a lot of birds with one stone, and has also managed to violate multiple rules in one shot.

He was driving along the I-88 in West Suburban Aurora, where at that point he had already passed the 11 hour limit, and 14 hour limit of straight driving. In fact, he was driving approximately 30 hours straight with minimal sleep, and had lied in his logs.

The result? Two fully illuminated stationary vehicles – one an Illinois State Trooper with his emergency lights on as well as an Illinois Tollway vehicle with an activated warning arrow. As he crashed both vehicles consequentially burst into a gulf of flames.

The Illinois State Trooper who was injured from the crash, Balder, 38, remained hospitalized Wednesday at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood in a medically-induced coma. The father of two has been a Navy reservist since 1994 and was given a hero's welcome home last summer after returning home to Oswego following his third tour in Africa. 

The Tollway worker who was killed, Petrella, became the first Illinois Tollway employee since 2003 to be killed on the job. The 39-year-old father of two was an equipment operator with the Illinois Tollway since 2005 and began his career as a toll collector, officials said.

Years prior, in 2001, Valesquez had been arrested for selling two kilos of cocaine to an undercover police officer. He was arrested at the time and sentenced to 50 months in Federal Prison.

Now, his accident has gotten him charged with Class 4 felonies of operating a CMV while impaired/fatigued, a false report of record and duty status, driving beyond the 11 hour rule, and driving beyond the 14 hour rule. He was charged as well for failure to reduce speed for avoiding an accident, in addition to failure to yield to stationary emergency vehicles (Scott’s Law).

His history of driving violations included convictions for speeding and improper backing on a one-way street, and a collision resulting in property damage in March of 2013.

The prosecutor in the latest case had stated that Valesquez had been intoxicated at the time of the crash. His lawyer however put in the defense that his client’s blood-alcohol test indicated that he was in fact not under the influence at the time. 

It was rebuffed with "It was an accident that didn't have to happen. Driving tired is as bad a driving impaired or driving drunk.”

His attorney, Steve Goldman responded to the DUI claim with: "That’s what’s alleged. I don’t know if that’s true," he described Velasquez as a "loving father and a loving husband."

"He's devastated. He’s devastated this happened," Goldman said of his client. "It was an unfortunate and tragic accident."

While he may have learned his lesson, lives with irreversibly affected and we want to implement prevention for the future. Safety comes first. Simply stay honest on your logs, and don’t give yourself a reason not to be. Load securely, keep sober, and rest up. The rest is the result of your choice: it’s reward or consequence.

The reward? Your life. The consequence?... Your life.