Robin Thomason saw the white truck first on Dial Place.
It was stopped at a stop sign.
Stopped for longer than was necessary.
Then, as Thomason approached the intersection – he had the right of way and no stop sign – the white truck darted across the road in front of him. He and the truck passenger locked eyes, as Thomason braked. There wasn’t even enough time for Thomason to lay on the horn.
The white truck was gone.
On Chestnut Ridge Church Road.
Thomason continued.
He came to the roundabout on Hwy 76 and got off at the first right. That put him enroute to his family farm and to the cemetery he owns, a short distance from Laurens District High School. He goes out often to check on both businesses.
And he thought, “I should see that white truck again.”
And he did – it was part of “a dust cloud” after the white truck T-boned a red SUV, a wreck that resulted in the death of 3-year-old Madison Hines.
Thomason was the first one there. At the intersection of Hwy 76 and Chestnut Ridge Church Road. The SUV’s driver, Teresa Leopard, shaken and hurt, said to him, “Robin, help us.” He checked on Teresa then Kinsley in the back seat – on the driver’s side of the vehicle. He went to the other side – the smashed in rear door, passenger’s side – to check on Chelsey Hines. She wanted to know about Madison.
Thomason took the child from her car seat, through the broken window, and onto the ground – to administer CPR, mindful of her small body to do light chest compressions, and started working.
He was working, struggling to save a life. Kinsley came and knelt beside them. “Kinsley came out of the vehicle, came around, very upset, obviously crying. That little girl held her dying sister’s hand the whole time I worked on her.”
Then, the EMTs came, and took Madison away.
“In my mind, I felt she would pass away,” Thomason said.
The emergency crew tended to the others – Kinsley, Chelsey, Teresa, all seriously injured – who had been on their way to Teresa’s parents’ house in the Watts Mill area of Laurens, on a Sunday – December 8, 2023 – which before this had been a day of celebration. Kinsley had been baptized. Their brother, Carson, had a birthday. Madison’s 4th birthday was less than a week away. The family was celebrating their life.
They laid Madison to rest, the next Saturday, on her birthday. Today, the Hines have established a foundation in her honor.
More than a year later, Chelsey Hines, Teresa Leopard, and Robin Thomason were the first three witnesses against the man who was driving that white truck. He is alleged to have run the stop sign, T-boned the red SUV, caused the death of Madison Hines – the charge is reckless homicide – and he allegedly was driving without a license.
The prosecution in the trial that started Tuesday says that second charge may not sound serious, but it indicative of what it says is Gabriel Arteaga’s unwillingness to do “the bare minimum” in order to live in the United States.
The defense spent the first day of testimony laying its case – they allege that instead of just seeing the white truck, Thomason was chasing the white truck, that he told a State Trooper that he was “getting the license number” and he was “hauling a-s-s” after the vehicle; Thomason said he has no recollection of a conversation like that. They are going to say Teresa and Chelsey were distracted in the front seat – they asked an investigator if within the contents of the red SUV wasn’t there a holder for a cellphone and a holder for the GPS device.
Chelsey Hines testified that both girls were in high spirits and Madison was kicking the back of her seat, as kids are prone to do from time to time, and when she was told to stop, Madison said, “Mommy, I love you.”
And, those were the last words the mother heard from her daughter. Teresa Leopard said she saw the white truck coming, from behind Chelsey sitting in the front passenger’s seat. It was “slow motion,” she said. “It sounded like a bomb went off.”
The truck caused what investigators call “an intrusion” in the door where Madison was sitting, in her car seat; but one of the Highway Patrol investigators admitted he never measured the size of the “intrusion”.
There was no mention in court on Tuesday of Arteaga’s immigration status; but one investigator said later at the hospital, Arteaga could not produce a driver’s license, but did have a complementary document from Mexico. Arteaga carries the label of “illegal immigrant” from social media and news reports from after that fateful day on a straight stretch of road west of Laurens.
If he is convicted by a Laurens County jury, Arteaga could be sentenced to 10 years in prison. After his arrest, he was granted a magistrate’s bond, but that was revoked later. On his jail listing, Arteaga has two “hold for other agencies” notifications. His trial continues Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. in the Hillcrest Square Courthouse.
An expert in interpreting air bags deployment data is expected to testify, and there has been no detailed testimony yet about an autopsy.
The three initial witnesses, the victim’s grandmother, the victim’s mother, and the man who tried to save her live, testified emotionally but never breaking down in front of the jury. The defense had no questions for Chelsey Hines and just a couple for Teresa Leopard and Robin Thomason. The first person on the scene, Thomason had given a well-detailed statement of what he saw and did before and after the collision, which ripped apart both vehicles, saying he has driven this route multiple times a day.
At the scene of the carnage, Thomason told Arteaga what he had done -- the witness said he speaks a little Spanish -- “I was laser focused, like everyone says, an adrenaline situation. When I got my wits about me, I approached him and told him he killed a baby. I wanted him to know what he had done.”
The Foundation here.
