Bus company ordered to pay $5.2 million in bus crash case

EDINBURG — An Hidalgo County jury has entered a $5.2 million judgment against a Mexican bus company it deemed partially responsible for the 2007 deaths of three Edinburg women, their family’s attorney said Monday.

Virginia Salinas, 28, and her 71-year-old grandmother, Irene Garza, died Nov. 10 of that year, when a truck they were riding in collided with a bus operated by Monterrey-based Autobuses Del Noreste. Salinas’ 9-year-old daughter — Veronica — was also killed in the crash.

Evidence presented during the week long trial suggested that bus driver Victor Torres overshot a stop sign outside of Los Herreras, N.L. — a community about 83 miles southwest of Reynosa — placing his vehicle out in the intersection after a sharp curve in the road.

“(The jury) had great power to bring justice to this family,” said Mark A. Cantu, who represented the family in its suit against the bus company.

An investigation by Mexican authorities conducted shortly after the wreck placed no criminal responsibility on the bus driver, who was released from custody moments after the crash, according to media reports from that country.

But Cantu argued at trial that Autobuses Del Noreste had acted negligently by allowing its employees to travel at unsafe speeds and disregard traffic laws.

The bus company’s lawyers suggested instead that Manrique Salinas shouldered most of the blame, saying he was traveling at more than 60 mph around a sharp turn on a dark night and slammed his truck into the stopped bus.

Officials from Autobuses del Noreste did not return calls for comment on the verdict Monday, but its attorney Jim Grissom, of Edinburg, said that the company is considering appealing the decision.

Autobuses del Noreste operates 80 routes across northeastern Mexico and southern Texas a day — including more than 20 stops daily at the downtown McAllen Bus Terminal.

It is at least the second Mexican bus company to find itself mired in civil litigation over a deadly wreck involving Rio Grande Valley residents.

In May, a group of families filed suit against Monterrey-based Grupo Senda Autotransporte claiming that company negligence led to a March 16 wreck that resulted in the death of 11 passengers outside of Zacatecas, Zac.

A trial date has not yet been set in that case.

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Jeremy Roebuck covers courts and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach him at (956) 683-4437.