A commercial truck driver from Louisiana rear-ended a vehicle on Interstate 55 just south of St. Louis on September 28, 2025. The collision caused a chain reaction involving eight vehicles. Richard Allen Holden, 45, hit a Toyota Camry with Vanessa Y. Knowles, 63, and Donnie Briggs, 66, both from Memphis, Tennessee, inside. Both women perished in the crash. Their car hit local mom Darla P. Parris, 53, who also died. When investigators spoke to Holden, he reportedly told them that he had started to slow down, but the dash cam footage told a different story.
According to a probable cause statement from the Missouri State High Patrol, the accident occurred in the northbound lanes of the highway headed toward St. Louis. The eight vehicles driven by the victims were all moving slowly in the right lane, “where the left lane was closing and there was a forcible merge lane closing the left lane,” the statement notes.
Holden, driving a 2022 Freightliner, was also traveling in the right lane but at approximately 70 miles per hour. “Roadway evidence revealed minimal or even no attempt by Holden to slow the 2022 Freightliner before the front of it crashed through the line of vehicles,” police noted…