Dallas, TX — October 5, 2024, 43-year-old Francisco Mancera Juarez was killed in a single-vehicle accident on Interstate 35E in Dallas.

According to authorities, the incident happened around 3:50 a.m. on the 400 block of South I-35E (R.L. Thornton Freeway) near Ann Arbor Avenue. Preliminary investigation suggests Francisco Mancera Juarez was driving a GMC Sierra pickup south on the freeway when he reportedly failed to maintain a single lane. The pickup ran off the road between the travel lanes and the exit ramp toward Ann Arbor, then crashed into the base of a light tower.

Francisco Mancera Juarez was fatally injured in the crash. No other vehicles or people were involved.

No further information is currently available.

Commentary by Attorney Michael Grossman

After a single-vehicle accident, people have a tendency to assume the driver made a mistake like getting distracted, speeding, or being intoxicated. Authorities seemingly had at least one of those on their minds, as they requested toxicology tests on the victim.

Is it possible that a driver error was responsible for the crash? Of course. Could there also be more to it than that—poor visibility, a blown tire, a medical emergency? Absolutely. That's why it's crucial to make sure that every possibility is properly evaluated, so the true cause is found and other explanations are ruled out. That's why it can be helpful to consider some questions, like:

1. Did police do a thorough investigation? Ideally the answer would always be "yes," but unfortunately that's not the case. Some jurisdictions don't have the resources to train or equip their officers for comprehensive accident reconstruction. As a result, traffic investigators may move on to other assignments before their work is really done. That's unfair to victims and families who want to know what happened, but in some cases there's little police can do besides offer a "best guess."
2. Was the vehicle defective? Sadly the Dallas victim can't tell investigators what happened on the interstate, so instead they'll have to consider various possibilities. That includes mechanical defects; while fairly rare, they still happen more often than people realize. Detecting them takes specialized training and sensitive equipment, though, so many officers might not recognize signs of a vehicle malfunction if they saw one.
3. Did someone collect and examine electronic data? Like it or not, much of what we do every day is recorded. That's true of auto accidents too, and the evidence in cell phones, dashcams, and vehicle "black box" recorders can be crucial to understanding what happened just before a crash.

That's far from a complete list of questions to address, but they're good examples of what information must be gathered to find the whole story. The primary goal of the investigation should always be to get answers for the people who need and deserve them, like the victim's loved ones. If they feel they got that from authorities, that's ideal. If instead they have doubts or more questions going unanswered, someone else may need to check whether anything slipped through the cracks.