PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Prosecutors called eight witnesses Friday in the criminal trial of Brandon Bostian, the former Amtrak engineer who was piloting the train that derailed in Port Richmond seven years ago, killing eight people.
The prosecution called police officers to walk jurors through pictures they had taken of the crash scene.
Those photos included gruesome shots of riders killed in the derailment, victims underneath train cars, and even dismembered by the wrenching of the cars off the track.
The judge had allowed several, but not all, of the photos into evidence.
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She warned jurors beforehand that they could not let the pictures inflame their passions, that they must evaluate them simply as evidence of the prosecution’s charge that the defendant accelerated into what’s known as the Frankford curve, a particularly treacherous part of the route between Philadelphia and New York.
The medical examiner testified about the extent of the victims’ injuries.
Bostian is charged with causing the catastrophe when he accelerated instead of slowing down to take the curve, as he was trained to do. In 2019, he had 254 charges including involuntary manslaughter and reckless endangerment dismissed.
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Among the other witnesses was a passenger who survived the crash. She told of borrowing Bostian’s phone to call her father and testified that Bostian told her they were at Frankford Junction. Her father also testified, confirming that he heard Bostian give the correct location of the derailment.
In opening arguments, prosecutors said Bostian should have been in control of his train, despite radio traffic warning about trespassers on the tracks throwing rocks at trains and a SEPTA conductor being injured when his train was struck by rocks.
Bostian’s attorney, Brian McMonagle, countered that it was the people throwing rocks who actually caused the accident, distracting and disorienting Bostian who, until that moment, had been an exemplary engineer.
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Accidents, he said in opening arguments, become criminal when you consciously disregard risk—texting while driving, for example.
Bostian, he asserted, never disregarded the safety of his crew or passengers. An NTSB investigation showed no phone activity and nothing in Bostian’s blood to impair his judgment.
The trial is expected to take about a week.
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