Lodi Highway 99 Big Rig Crash Kills 2 Teens, 5 Hurt

What CHP and Local Reporting Say Happened

According to the California Highway Patrol's Stockton office and reporting from the Lodi News-Sentinel, Fox40, CBS Sacramento, and Hoodline, traffic was slowing on northbound Highway 99 near Harney Lane shortly after noon on Tuesday, May 19, 2026. A Freightliner Cascadia tractor-trailer operated by Amritsar Trans Inc. failed to slow with the flow of cars and plowed into the back of three passenger vehicles ahead of it.

The Kia Forte carrying the two victims absorbed the worst of the impact. Both occupants, brothers Clark James Fojas, 20, and Peter Joshua Fojas, 16, of Stockton, were pronounced dead at the scene. Five other people were transported to local hospitals. CHP later confirmed that two of those patients had major injuries, while the others sustained moderate trauma.

The driver of the big rig, later identified as 24-year-old Manvir Singh of Manteca, climbed out of the cab and fled on foot, leaving the rig and the victims behind. CHP and assisting agencies set up a perimeter and located Singh a short distance from the wreckage. He was taken into custody and booked into San Joaquin County Jail on felony charges that include vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence, hit-and-run causing death or injury, and resisting or obstructing a peace officer. Singh was arraigned in San Joaquin County Superior Court on Thursday, May 21, 2026, where he entered a plea of not guilty. A judge set bail at $400,000 and ordered him to surrender his passport and submit to GPS monitoring after finding him a flight risk. Prosecutors allege there were no skid marks at the scene, indicating no attempt to brake, and that Singh tried to drag a victim from the wreck before fleeing on foot. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for June 10, 2026. Court records also indicate Singh had been employed by the trucking company only about a week before the crash, a detail that can bear directly on a negligent hiring, training, and supervision claim against the carrier.

Northbound Highway 99 was shut down for several hours while CHP's Multi-disciplinary Accident Investigation Team documented the scene. According to publicly available motor-carrier records, Amritsar Trans Inc. is a small carrier based in Manteca with a five-truck fleet. CHP said the investigation into what caused the rig to fail to brake remains open, with fatigue, distraction, and mechanical condition all on the table.

Why This Crash Goes Well Beyond One Driver

A fully loaded combination vehicle that fails to slow for stopped traffic at highway speed is not just a tragic accident. It is a documented, recurring failure mode in the commercial trucking industry, and federal regulators treat it as one of the most serious safety problems on American highways. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) sets binding rules that apply to any commercial carrier moving freight, including small operators with only a handful of trucks. Those rules cover how long a driver can be on duty, how often a driver must rest, how the carrier must screen and train its drivers, and what records the carrier must keep.

Federal rules apply to Amritsar Trans Inc. and to any other small carrier of that size operating intrastate or interstate commerce. Those obligations include hours-of-service limits, electronic logging device requirements, drug and alcohol testing standards, and driver qualification files. In any fatal collision involving a commercial motor vehicle, CHP investigators typically subpoena ELD logs, dispatch records, maintenance histories, and driver employment files. Civil counsel for the victims does the same.

In a case like this one, the first questions investigators and civil attorneys ask are simple but consequential. When did the driver's shift start? When was the last legally compliant break? Do the electronic logs match the fuel receipts, dispatch records, and toll data? Was the driver properly screened and qualified before being put behind the wheel of an 80,000-pound vehicle? Those answers can take a case from a single driver's failure to a documented carrier-level pattern that anchors a civil claim.

The Legal Picture: Driver, Carrier, and Punitive Exposure

A fatal commercial-truck collision triggers a layered liability analysis that goes well beyond the person who was behind the wheel. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations, the California Vehicle Code, and California's common-law negligence doctrines all create overlapping duties owed by trucking companies to the motoring public. Families of the two teenage decedents and the five injured victims have several distinct avenues for civil recovery.

Under California's doctrine of respondeat superior, a motor carrier is vicariously liable for the negligent acts of its driver committed within the course and scope of employment. Beyond vicarious liability, the carrier itself can be directly liable for negligent hiring, negligent retention, negligent training, negligent supervision, and negligent entrustment of a commercial vehicle. Where a small carrier has failed to enforce federal screening standards, those documents often unlock significant additional liability that exists independent of whatever the driver did or did not do on the day of the crash.

Recoverable damages in a wrongful death case under California Code of Civil Procedure section 377.60 may include the loss of the decedent's financial support, the loss of love, companionship, moral support, and guidance, and reasonable funeral and burial expenses. With a 16-year-old and a 20-year-old, lifetime earnings projections can be substantial. Economists are often retained to model the income each victim would likely have earned over a full working life. An experienced abogados especializados en casos de muerte injusta coordinates these claims so that statutory beneficiaries do not unintentionally waive rights or split a recovery improperly.

Fleeing the scene of a fatal collision is independently actionable under California law and is also a recognized aggravator that can support a claim for punitive damages under California Civil Code section 3294. Conduct that shows a conscious disregard for the rights or safety of others, such as abandoning injured occupants and attempting to flee, may justify enhanced damages on top of compensatory recovery. Punitive exposure also gives plaintiffs leverage to demand full disclosure of the carrier's insurance coverage stack, including primary, excess, and umbrella policies.

What Investigators and Civil Attorneys Look For Next

On the criminal side, San Joaquin County prosecutors will work from the CHP report, witness statements, the booking sheet, and any toxicology returned from the post-crash medical workup. A driver facing felony vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence, hit-and-run causing death or injury, and resisting and obstructing is looking at a very different exposure than a driver facing simple misdemeanor counts, and that difference can matter to the civil case as well.

On the civil side, the first priority is usually evidence preservation. Counsel for the families will often send formal preservation letters to the trucking company, the leasing company that may own the tractor or trailer, the maintenance vendor, and any third-party logistics provider that scheduled the load. Those letters put the recipients on notice that destroying dashcam footage, telematics data, electronic logs, payroll records, dispatch communications, or training files can carry serious legal consequences. ELD data can roll off within months, so the time pressure here is real.

From there, the case can move into a paper-heavy phase. Driver qualification files, medical examiner certificates, drug and alcohol testing records, post-accident drug screens, and DOT inspection histories all become relevant. Many big rig cases turn on a single number on a single page, like a logbook entry that contradicts a fuel receipt by ninety minutes, which is exactly why early preservation matters so much. Families who consult a abogado especializado en accidentes con camiones in the first days after a crash like this one give themselves the best chance of locking down that record before it disappears.