Trucker ‘burned alive’ after crash, NC officials say. Now, woman is going to prison
A trucker “burned alive” after a North Carolina crash — and now another driver is going to prison, officials said.
Jill Taylor was ordered to spend 10 to 13 years behind bars after she was convicted of second-degree murder on Monday, Oct. 31, according to the Fifteenth Prosecutorial District of North Carolina.
Taylor is accused of being impaired on the day of the deadly crash, which was reported at a time when she faced four pending DWI charges.
Prosecutors in a news release didn’t list attorney information for Taylor, a Columbus County resident.
The case dates to Feb. 18, 2018, when officials said Taylor was driving on U.S. Highway 74 through Columbus County, about 120 miles south of Raleigh.
“She was traveling at an extremely slow speed and also stopped in the right lane on a 70 m.p.h. stretch of the highway at night without any hazard lights on,” prosecutors wrote in their release.
Officials said truck driver Ricky Dale Crocker was on the highway and tried to move to another lane to avoid Taylor’s car. But he instead hit the car, sending his 18-wheeler careening off the road, where it “came to rest in the trees,” according to prosecutors.
The truck caught fire, trapping Crocker inside, prosecutors said.
The day of the crash, Taylor was accused of abusing Dust-Off, a canned product designed for cleaning electronics.
“An investigation by the North Carolina Highway Patrol showed that Taylor was impaired from huffing Dust-Off and taking prescription medication,” the district attorney’s office said. “Earlier that day, Taylor had fled from Wilmington Police Department officers after being passed out behind the wheel of her vehicle from huffing Dust-Off.”
The Fifteenth Prosecutorial District of North Carolina in its news release didn’t reveal the ages of Taylor and Crocker. The office didn’t immediately share additional details with McClatchy News on Nov. 2.
