After an "extensive investigation" into a fatal accident on January 19, 2025 on the Cheat Lake Bridge along I-68 East near Morgantown, West Virginia, police coordinated the arrest of truck driver Sukhjinder Singh of New York on charges of negligent homicide.
Singh was arrested in Phoenix, Arizona on March 4, 2025, according to a news release distributed via the Facebook page for the Monongalia County Sheriff's Office in West Virginia. Police had previously spoken to Singh after the initial incident in January, and according to an earlier release, the driver "informed deputies that he lost control of his vehicle due to severe snowstorm conditions, resulting in" a jack-knifing accident.
But later that same day, a local police department "received a missing person’s report for Kevin C. Lataille, a 59-year-old Pennsylvania resident." Lataille's family last spoke with him while he was driving home from his shift at Eat'n Park in Morgantown. Using location data from Lataille's phone, surveillance footage of the area, and eventually aerial drone footage, police confirmed the "presence of a submerged vehicle" and Lataille's remains in Cheat Lake.
The sheriff's office said it had questioned Singh via a translator on February 28, but the driver at that point denied hitting any cars. (Federal regulations require commercial drivers to speak English, but a 2016 memo from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration asked police not to enforce that regulation if the driver could communicate in English with the help of their phone or otherwise sufficient enough to satisfy law enforcement and get through an inspection/interaction.)
[Related: State bill would criminalize non-citizen truck drivers]
"Following weeks of investigation, Monongalia County Sheriff's Detectives and the Accident Reconstructionist Team determined that Sukhjinder Singh’s tractor was traveling at an unsafe speed despite hazardous road conditions," the sheriff's office wrote in an earlier release. "Witness testimony described Sukhjinder Singh's driving as reckless and even criminal. Investigators also confirmed that Singh’s tractor had struck another vehicle prior to reaching the bridge and failed to stop."
Law enforcement concluded Singh "was operating the suspect tractor in a reckless manner, striking multiple vehicles, including Lataille’s, and driving at unsafe speeds for the road conditions" and issued a warrant for hisarrest.
The "arrest in Phoenix, Arizona, was the result of coordinated efforts by law enforcement agencies," the sheriff's office wrote in the press release. He is currently in custody, and further legal proceedings will be handled by the Monongalia County Prosecutor’s Office, which could include more charges.
The Monongalia County Sheriff's Office extended its "deepest condolences to the family and loved ones of Kevin C. Lataille."
