Police arrested a Baltimore County man in connection to an August crash on Interstate 395 that took the life of 50-year-old Robert Taylor Horne, who had pulled over on the elevated highway to assist the motorist of a disabled vehicle, the Maryland Transportation Authority said Thursday.
Police allege that 28-year-old Latrell S. Sanders of Windsor Mill was driving under the influence of alcohol at 101 mph when his Mercedes-Benz SUV crashed into another vehicle and then struck Horne, sending him over the edge of the highway and into the water below.
Baltimore City Fire Department rescuers recovered Horne’s body and pronounced him dead at the scene. Latrell was transported to a local hospital and sustained minor injuries.
Latrell has been charged with multiple offenses, including manslaughter, speeding and driving under the influence of alcohol. He turned himself in to police Wednesday at the Jennifer Road Detention Center in Anne Arundel County.
Online court records show that Latrell had driving issues in the past. He had been pulled over and charged with driving while impaired twice before, including once in 2017 at nearly the exact same spot as the deadly August crash. In 2020, he was pulled over for driving 90 mph on I-95 just south of downtown near the interchange with I-695. He was charged with driving on a suspended license.
Sgt. Brady McCormick, a spokesperson for the MDTA, stressed that the thorough scene reconstruction conducted by his agency was part of a lengthy homicide investigation into Horne’s death. The investigation included drone images of the scene, witness interviews, pulling medical records and even information from the vehicles involved to determine speeds at impact and immediately before impact.
“We talk about these as crashes not as accidents, and that’s done intentionally because they are absolutely preventable,” said McCormick.
Days after the Aug. 13 crash, members of Horne’s family mourned and celebrated him as a “gentle giant” and good Samaritan who often stopped to assist disabled vehicles. The August crash that took his life was the second time he had been struck by a car while stopping to render assistance to a driver pulled over on the side of a road.
The MDTA said in a release that “Horne utilized multiple warning lights to alert approaching drivers of the stopped vehicles.”
