Faribault semi-truck crash: Driver charged for death of unborn child, other injuries

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A section of I-35 closed near Faribault following a crash that led to a pregnant woman losing her baby.

FARIBAULT, Minn. (FOX 9) - A semi-truck driver is facing criminal charges for a six-vehicle crash last year that caused a pregnant woman to lose her unborn baby and injured eight other people in 2023.

That driver, Joel Adam Sassman, 52, of Fredericksburg, Iowa, is charged with the death of an unborn child and eight counts of criminal vehicular operation that caused bodily harm.

What happened?

Deputies from the Rice County Sheriff's Office and troopers from the Minnesota State Patrol responded to reports of a crash in the northbound lanes of Interstate 35 near mile marker 53 around 12:20 p.m. on Aug. 20, 2023.

The criminal complaint states the crash happened when a semi-truck rear-ended a Chevy Suburban, which was pushed into a Ford Escape, which was pushed into a Honda Accord. The Accord then went into the ditch, and the Escape continued to move forward until it was pushed into a Volvo SUV, which rotated and hit a second Ford Escape.

A woman in the Suburban was 31-weeks pregnant when the crash happened and suffered life-threatening injuries, including a skull fracture and intracranial bleeding, according to the criminal complaint. She was airlifted to the hospital.

Doctors performed an emergency C-section, but the baby did not survive. A medical examination determined the baby died from blunt force trauma caused by the crash.

Several other people were injured in the crash, including three young children who were in the Suburban.

A witness whose vehicle was struck in the crash told a Minnesota State Trooper that they could see traffic slowing down from about 1000 feet away, and that construction signs warned traffic to slow down about two or three miles from the crash.

Investigation

The criminal complaint states that Sassman told a trooper "Everything just stopped." When the trooper asked him to elaborate, Sassman reportedly said "Everything just stopped, and I ran into the back of that car."

Investigators then searched Sassman's cell phone and found that in the two hours that Sassman was driving before the crash, he "sent eight sex chats, conducted multiple searches on Adult Friend Finder Network, visited Cams.com live sex chat, direct messaged a female on Instagram, received a Snapchat labled ‘B------’ and changed the orientation of his phone to landscape five times."

Investigators then got a warrant to search Sassman's Friend Finder Accounts and found that a message was sent two minutes before the crash happened.

The criminal complaint states a crash reconstruction specialist determined the cause of the crash was Sassman's failure to recognize and react in time to slowed traffic in the road.