HARTFORD, Conn. — A truck driver who was involved in a 2019 crash that killed seven members of a motorcycle club in New Hampshire rejected a plea deal on Thursday that would have kept him out of jail on a drunk driving charge stemming from an earlier arrest in Connecticut.
Volodymyr Zhukovskyy, 28, of West Springfield, appeared in Hartford Superior Court for about three minutes on Thursday on the charge of driving while under the influence of alcohol or drugs in May 2019, a month before the fatal crash. He refused a chemical test at the time of the incident, which should have triggered the suspension of his commercial driver’s license in Massachusetts, but that didn’t happen.
During Thursday’s court hearing, Zhukovskyy’s lawyer said he rejected a plea agreement from prosecutors. Supervisory Assistant State’s Attorney Edward R. Azzarosaid the agreement called for a six-month suspended sentence, 18 months of probation, a driver’s license suspension, and required him to perform 100 hours of community service. Zhukovskyy’s license is currently suspended and it’s unclear how long that would have lasted under the deal he rejected.
Judge Courtney Chaplin asked Zhukovskyy if he understood his decision and was aware that a guilty verdict at trial could result in jail time.
“Yes, your honor,” he said.
The court scheduled another hearing for Feb. 15, but has yet to set a trial date.
Zhukovskyy did not respond to questions as he left the courtroom. “He doesn’t want to talk,” his lawyer, John O’Brien, told a reporter on the way out.
In May 2019, Zhukovskyy was arrested on the charge of driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol in East Windsor, Conn.
The following month, Zhukovskyy was driving a truck pulling a trailer in Randolph, N.H., when he struck members of the Jarheads Motorcycle Club, a charitable group of Marine veterans. Motorcyclists from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island were among those killed.
He was charged with seven counts each of manslaughter and negligent homicide, with prosecutors alleging that he caused the collision while under the influence of drugs. In August 2022, a jury acquitted him of all charges after deliberating for less than three hours.
During the trial, Zhukovskyy’s lawyers acknowledged that he had ingested cocaine, heroin, and fentanyl at his home on the morning of the crash, but argued he was not impaired at the time of the crash, about 10 1/2 hours later.
The fatal crash exposed widespread failures by the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles to track troubled drivers like Zhukovskyy, who had a lengthy history of violations and arrests. The state overhauled its systems for handling alerts about law-breaking drivers after it was revealed that the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles had failed to act on warnings from Connecticut shortly before the crash to suspend Zhukovskyy’s license.
The Globe published an investigation that exposed how government negligence has for decades allowed drivers with menacing traffic records to remain on the road nationwide. The report, which was awarded the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting, also cited loopholes rampant in the trucking industry’s regulatory system.
Sean Cotter can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him @cotterreporter.
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