Mom sentenced to 18 years to life in ‘murder by semi truck’ case

A woman who admitted to using a semi truck to kill her own daughter on an Ohio interstate has been sentenced to prison.

Thirty-eight year old Kia Ferguson was sentenced late last month in the Lake County Common Pleas Court to 18 years to life in prison. She has also been stripped of her driver’s license for life.

Ferguson pled guilty in June to charges of murder and attempted murder for a crash that killed her 10 year old daughter and severely injured her six year old son.

The crash occurred on January 25, 2019, in Mentor, Ohio.

Prosecutors say that Ferguson drove across two lanes of traffic with her headlights off, timing it so that her vehicle collided with a UPS semi truck on I-90. The crash caused Ferguson’s car to skid down an embankment.

Ferguson’s daughter passed away as a result of the crash. Ferguson and her son both suffered critical injuries. The truck driver was unhurt.

Ferguson was arrested following a nine-month investigation after Mentor city officials said that during the course of the investigation “it became clear that Ms. Ferguson intentionally drove in front of the semi truck.”

The legal team representing Ferguson said that she had been fired from her high pressure job and was suffering from a major depressive episode during January 2019 leading up to the intentional crash.