Where a deadly Central Texas school bus crash investigation stands 1 year later

It’s been over a year since a deadly Central Texas school bus crash in Bastrop claimed the lives of a pre-kindergartner and a UT Austin student. The concrete truck driver that collided with a Hays CISD school bus filled with 55 children and adults plus another vehicle is set to appear in court next month.

Although the impact of this crash will never go away for many, there is now some action being taken to help prevent something similar from happening again. Here’s an update on everything we know so far about the Bastrop bus crash case since 2024:

Hays CISD Chief Communications Officer, Tim Savoy remembers the day of the Bastrop school bus crash vividly. On March 22, 2024, 44 pre-K children and 11 adults from Tom Green Elementary School were traveling back from a field trip to the zoo when a concrete pumper truck veered into oncoming traffic and struck the bus on State Highway 21 in Bastrop County. 

Although the Hays school bus driver attempted to swerve off the two-way road to avoid the collision, the concrete truck driver still hit the bus head-on, causing it to rollover. Five-year-old Ulises Rodriguez Montoya, who was onboard the bus, and 33-year-old Ryan Wallace, who drove a vehicle behind the bus, both died in the crash.

The school bus involved in the crash had no seatbelts, which resulted in over 50 injuries. Savoy explained that almost immediately after the incident, the school’s community came together to help raise money for those impacted and persuade the district to replace its older models with new seatbelt-equipped buses. 

“Everybody in the community really rallied once they learned of the tragedy, to offer the support and help that they could,” Savoy told MySA. “Within a month, to our school board’s credit, they said, ‘let’s figure out how we can work at the fastest possible speed to accelerate this process of putting the seat belts on the busses.'” 

However, replacing the remaining Hays CISD buses without seatbelts wasn’t the only major issue in this case. 

Concrete truck driver, Jerry Hernandez, was arrested and charged with criminally negligent homicide after admitting to authorities he consumed drugs the night before and early morning hours of the crash. Police said in an affidavit that Hernandez had a history of failed drug tests and a “prohibited” commercial driver’s license status, but a loophole in the Texas Department of Public Safety registrar system allowed him to go undetected. 

Authorities claimed Hernandez was aware of his own status but did not disclose it to FJM Concrete LLC, the company he drove for at the time of the crash, the affidavit states. FJM Concrete owner, Francisco Martinez Jr., told police he did not verify the status of Hernandez’s CDL or his status through the Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse before hiring him, which prompted authorities to also investigate his business.

In early April 2024, a Hays County court issued a warrant to arrest Martinez for an unpaid ticket for employing an unlicensed truck driver in 2021. Within days, over a dozen people involved or affiliated with someone in the crash including a teacher, Montoya and Wallace’s parents, as well as other families with children on the bus filed lawsuits against Hernandez and Martinez for the injuries/damages they sustained. 

Since then, most of the civil lawsuits filed against Hernandez and Martinez have been closed, except for the latest one filed in February of this year.

Savoy said that the school district did not sue Hernandez or Martinez, and its loss as a governmental agency was the school bus itself, which was covered by insurance. He added that the district helped connect families and employees to state services because arrests were involved in this case, it qualified everyone on the bus to be compensated or assisted through the State Crime Victims Compensation Fund. 

“In those cases, if the insurance policy was too little to cover the damage, which I believe it was on the company’s part, then there are funds and services available through the state for the crime victims compensation plan,” Savoy said. “The loss of our bus is really, really low priority for us. Our main hope was that our kids and our staff and the adults on the bus were all made as whole as possible.”

Hernandez now faces two counts of manslaughter, a second-degree felony, and two counts of criminally negligent homicide, a state jail felony. He was booked into the Hays County Jail, but was transferred to a Bastrop County Jail in March 2025, where he remains today, per court records. He’s scheduled to have a pre-trial hearing for his criminal case in Bastrop County on June 23. MySA reached out to Hernandez and Martinez’s lawyers, but did not hear back prior to publication. 

It’s unclear. SAFER online records show FJM Concrete LLC has an active US DOT number, meaning the company is still registered with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA). There’s no out-of-service date listed for the company, based in Smithville, a Bastrop County city.

According to the records, FJM has three drivers with eight power unit vehicles. Records show FJM listed one out-of-service vehicle, but no crashes were reported to FMCSA by the State of Texas 24 months prior to May 14. 

There is also no website or social media presence for FJM Concrete LLC, so it’s unclear whether or not Martinez is still operating the company.

Earlier this month, voters in Hays CISD approved a $7 million proposition for the district to purchase the remaining 22 new buses with seatbelts it needs to be fully equipped. Since the crash, Savoy said that now 90% of its regular route buses are equipped with seatbelts, as the district has been steadily reducing the use of older models for daily use. 

Savoy estimates that the district could start ordering the new buses as soon as this summer, but it could still take up to a year before all Hays CISD buses have seatbelts, depending on how long it takes for the buses to come in from the manufacturer. Last month, the Texas Senate passed a bill to mandate all state school districts to have seat belts on their entire fleet of school buses. 

SB 546 must now be approved by the Texas House before it can be signed into law by Governor Greg Abbott. While Savoy supports the state-wide measure, he understands the impact this case has had on Montoya and Wallace’s family and the Hays CISD community will last forever.

“There’s nothing you can do to replace a lost child,” Savoy said. “I think that at the end of the day, is the hardest thing for everyone to really grapple with, because, we can put our seat belt plan in place. We can advocate for laws that change regulations on concrete truck drivers, and there can be criminal prosecutions and civil lawsuits, all of those things but at the end of the day that will not bring Ulises back.”