An Ohio truck driver has been sentenced to 22 years in prison for a devastating highway crash that killed a married couple and their one-year-old son. The family’s deaths were later featured in a controversial political attack ad.
Modou Ngom, 51, received the maximum sentence after his Freightliner caused a fiery nine-vehicle pileup that claimed the lives of Luke Soposki, 37, his 36-year-old wife, Lynnea, and their baby son, Logan.
Ngom became a U.S. citizen in 2015. Ohio investigators, however, allege that he secured citizenship through a fraudulent identity after arriving in the United States during the 1990s.
Thursday’s sentencing prompted an emotional courtroom confrontation. Relatives of the victims accused Ngom of failing to show remorse, while the judge condemned him for destroying an entire family.
‘You wiped out an entire family,’ Delaware County Common Pleas Court Judge Marianne Hemmeter told Ngom. ‘And this court can’t make it better.’
The crash occurred on April 11, when Ngom was driving his Freightliner semitruck north along Interstate 71, just outside Columbus. Traffic had slowed in a construction zone, but investigators said he failed to reduce his speed.
The truck slammed into the vehicles ahead, setting off a chain-reaction collision involving nine cars and trucks.
Disturbing surveillance video captured the white semitruck plowing into the backed-up traffic. At least one vehicle erupted in flames upon impact.
Ngom’s truck then crossed the median, forcing two additional vehicles from its path.
Truck driver Modou Ngom, 51, has been sentenced to 22-and-a-half years in prison after causing a horrific nine-vehicle crash that killed a young couple and their baby son in Ohio
Lynnea Soposki, 36, her husband Luke, 37, and their one-year-old son Logan were killed when Ngom’s semitruck plowed into traffic on Interstate 71 north of Columbus on April 11
The Soposkis were traveling together in their pickup truck when they were killed. Five other people sustained serious injuries in the pileup.
Lynnea worked as a veterinarian at Muirfield Animal Hospital in Dublin, Ohio. Luke was an analytical chemist.
Their deaths left relatives grieving the loss of three members of a young family in a single afternoon.
During the sentencing hearing, Lynnea’s brother, Jesse Mallen, confronted Ngom and accused him of being distracted by a tablet before the crash.
‘You were playing with a damn tablet while aiming a 40-ton weapon straight at the family’, he told the court.
Mallen also challenged what he described as the truck driver’s apparent lack of remorse.
‘Your poor family is pouring their hearts out, awash with remorse and I haven’t seen an ounce from you – have you no shame for what you did?’ he demanded.
Ohio State Highway Patrol investigators had previously stated that Ngom was not using a phone or tablet when the crash occurred.
Horrifying footage shows vehicles engulfed in flames after Ngom’s truck slammed into traffic, killing the family of three and leaving five other people seriously injured
Luke and Lynnea Soposki smile alongside their red-haired son Logan in a treasured family photograph, months before all three lost their lives in the devastating highway crash
Ngom was convicted in September following a four-day trial on three counts of aggravated vehicular homicide and five counts of vehicular assault.
The consequences of the crash have extended far beyond the three deaths.
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One surviving woman has filed a civil lawsuit claiming she suffered permanent injuries so severe that she can no longer independently care for herself or carry out basic daily activities.
The Soposki family estate has also brought a wrongful-death lawsuit against Ngom.
But the family’s suffering took another turn when photographs of Luke, Lynnea and Logan appeared in a Republican campaign advertisement attacking former Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown.
The commercial, titled ‘Dangerous for Ohio,’ was paid for by the National Republican Senatorial Committee and authorized by Republican Senator Jon Husted’s campaign ahead of their closely fought Senate race.
‘Sherrod Brown opened our borders to dangerous illegals – the consequences were deadly,’ the narrator declared.
The advertisement then displayed photographs of Ngom and the Soposki family alongside disturbing footage of the fatal crash.
An old photograph shows Lynnea Soposki embracing her brother, Jesse Mallen, who condemned the use of the family’s tragedy in a Republican political attack advertisement
Lynnea Soposki, second from right, is pictured with relatives in happier times, before the crash that killed her, her husband and their baby boy
Lynnea was a much-loved veterinarian at Muirfield Animal Hospital in Ohio, where colleagues remembered her as an extraordinary doctor and compassionate caregiver following her death
Mallen said he was horrified to discover that his sister, brother-in-law and nephew had become part of a political campaign without the family’s permission.
‘Our grief is not raw material for a campaign,’ he wrote after the advertisement began appearing across Ohio.
Mallen said he contacted Husted’s campaign by email and certified mail, asking for the family’s photograph to be removed.
‘What we all want is to be able to grieve in peace and privacy,’ he said. ‘For our family to be used in such a classless way by a politician, especially without being consulted.’
The advertisement aired for at least 16 days, with an estimated $1 million spent on the campaign, before being pulled.
Footage of it remained online attracting more than five million views.
For the Soposki family, the political arguments only added to their distress.
Lynnea’s brother Jesse Mallen condemned the political advertisement featuring photos of his sister’s family, saying relatives had never given permission for their loved ones to be used
Republican Senator Jon Husted’s campaign authorized the controversial ad which used images of the dead family to attack Democratic rival Sherrod Brown over immigration policy
‘Just unbelievable what these politicians will do,’ Luke’s father, Joseph Soposki, wrote after learning about the commercial. ‘Absolutely no compassion for the family.’
The political row centered on Ngom’s immigration history.
Ohio officials said he entered the United States in the 1990s and later used different names and birth dates to obtain identification and driving licenses.
The Department of Homeland Security subsequently confirmed that Ngom became a naturalized American citizen in 2015.
He had not been charged with any immigration-related offense, and independent fact-checkers found no evidence directly linking Brown’s voting record to the deadly crash.