Grand jury indicts truck driver in Tracy Morgan crash

A New Jersey grand jury has indicted the driver of the Walmart truck who caused the 2014 fatal crash involving Tracy Morgan.

The driver, Kevin Roper, was indicted Wednesday on charges of aggravated manslaughter, vehicular homicide and eight counts of aggravated assault.

The accident killed 62-year-old comedian James McNair and injured Morgan, Ardley Fuqua and Jeffrey Millea.

A judge has to review the grand jury transcripts, the AP said, and will tentatively revisit the case in January.

Tracy Morgan, seen at centre surrounded by his former 30 Rock co-stars (from left) Jack McBrayer, Tina Fey, Jane Krakowski and Alec Baldwin, has slowly returned to work since the 2014 accident, including hosting Saturday Night Live in October and announcing a new comedy tour.

Mr Roper’s lawyer, Roper’s attorney, David Glassman, sought to have the initial charges of vehicular homicide and assault by auto thrown out because of adverse publicity surrounding Morgan’s settlement of a lawsuit with Wal-Mart earlier this year.

Since he wasn’t in court for the indictment, Kevin is scheduled to be arraigned at some point in the future.

Aggravated manslaughter carries a 10 to 30-year prison term upon conviction, while a death-by-auto charge carries a five to 10-year prison sentence.

The day before the chain-reaction crash, which involved six vehicles, Roper apparently made an 800-mile overnight drive from Georgia to Delaware.

However, the NTSB also faulted Morgan and other passengers in the limo van for not wearing seat belts and not having their headrests in the optimal position, which investigators found contributed to the severity of their injuries.