A speeding truck driver from Illinois accused of deliberately sideswiping a man’s pickup and disabling it on the highway west of Gillette has had his cased elevated to felony-level court.
The Campbell County Attorney’s Office has charged the tractor-trailer driver, 32-year-old Alexander Tuttle, with aggravated assault, which is a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Tuttle’s case rose to Campbell County District Court on Monday. His arraignment is set for Dec. 17.
Wyoming Highway Patrol Trooper Kyle Hawn wrote an evidentiary affidavit for the case, and concluded that the victim and eyewitness statements, plus the evidence on scene, implicate Tuttle as the person at fault.
Hawn responded to a report of a hit-and run on Highway 50 west of Gillette the morning of Nov. 28.
He found a white pickup, damaged and disabled, straddling the sidewalk on the southbound side of the highway, wrote Hawn. A Gillette Police Department officer had already taken photos and gathered contact information from a eyewitness who’d been driving next to the crashed vehicles at the time.
One mile south of there, a Campbell County Sheriff’s Office deputy was sitting with the semitrailer and its driver, says the document.
The driver of the white pickup told Hawn he was driving southbound in the right-hand lane going between 45 and 50 mph. Another pickup was in the left-hand lane next to him and a black pickup drove slightly ahead of him, also in the left-hand lane, the man said.
The three pickups drove south in a staggered formation going the speed limit, the document relates, adding that the alleged victim didn’t know the other drivers.
The driver of the white pickup noticed the semitrailer speeding toward them in the right-hand lane. It then switched to the left-hand lane to go around the driver of the white pickup and it swerved at him, the man said.
The driver of the white pickup, aligned with the big truck’s cab, made eye contact with its driver and gestured at him with his shoulders and arm, wrote Hawn.
This time, the tractor trailer “again deliberately swerved into him by crossing into the right-hand lane, this time making contact with his white pickup truck and disabling it,” the trooper related from that interview.
The tractor-trailer, which had Illinois plates, drove south for a ways after that.
Next Up, Trucker Interview
Next, Hawn interviewed Tuttle, the driver of the semitrailer.
Tuttle said he was driving south going 50-55 mph, because he believed the speed limit was still 55, according to the affidavit.
The white pickup was in the right-hand lane and the black truck was in the left-hand lane, both in front of Tuttle, he said.
Tuttle was quickly approaching the black pickup and drew close to its rear when it slowed down, forcing him into the right-hand lane and behind the white pickup, the affidavit relates from Tuttle’s interview.
The white pickup slowed down, forcing Tuttle back into the left-hand lane, the trucker said.
There was a red traffic light ahead at the intersection of Highway 50 and West Lakeway Road, with another vehicle stopped at it, but Tuttle believed the light would turn green soon, so he kept coasting while trying to switch back into the right-hand lane and get in front of the white pickup, says Hawn’s account of the trucker’s interview.
The light turned green, and the white pickup wouldn’t let Tuttle change lanes, he told the trooper.
Tuttle told Hawn that the driver of the white pickup sped up and got next to Tuttle’s cab, gesturing at him with his shoulders and arm, then the white pickup driver intentionally swerved into him, crossing into the left-hand lane and driving at his truck in a 45-degree angle.
Tuttle drove south for a ways after this because he didn’t know where to pull over, he told the trooper.
Tie-Breaker
A female witness who’d been driving her silver pickup in the fray gave a tie-breaking account in a phone call with Hawn, which aligned more with the alleged victim’s story than with Tuttle’s, according to the affidavit.
She said she drove her silver pickup in the left-hand lane while the white pickup was slightly ahead of her in the right-hand lane.
The semitrailer sped up to their rears in the right-hand lane, then switched “abruptly” to the left-hand lane, cutting the woman off and forcing her to brake to avoid a wreck, Hawn wrote from the witness’s interview.
The truck swerved abruptly into the right-hand lane toward the white pickup, which appeared to slow down to avoid a wreck, then to draw up side-by-side with the cab, said the woman.
The witness said the trucker darted into the right-hand lane a second time, this time side-swiping the white pickup. She pulled over to see if the driver of the white pickup truck was OK, then she called police, the document says.
Debris
The evidence on scene showed that the initial impact happened on the southbound right-hand lane of travel, wrote Hawn.
Fresh tire marks had rubbed along the curb, twice in succession and north of where the pickup sat disabled on the sidewalk. Snow-covered tire marks also were located on the southbound curb, which bore the same tread pattern as the white pickup’s tries, says the affidavit.
“Tuttle said the white pickup truck swerved into him crossing into the left-hand lane at an approximately 45-degree angle,” wrote Hawn. “However, the damage to the white pickup truck’s front driver side end and corner are not consistent with that statement.”
Hawn noted that Tuttle’s vehicle weighed about 80,000 pounds.
Agents arrested Tuttle and took him to jail.
“Mr. Tuttle’s company dispatch center informed me that Mr. Tuttle’s dash camera was not turned on and therefore no footage was available of the incident,” added the trooper.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
