DATE: Wednesday, April 23, 1997             TAG: 9704230497

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B2   EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA 

SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 

DATELINE: DURHAM                            LENGTH:   26 lines

TRUCK DRIVER PLEADS NOT GUILTY IN WRECK

A Virginia truck driver pleaded not guilty in Durham Superior Court Monday to charges stemming from a crash last summer on Interstate 85 that killed eight people.

Esau Dixon, 57, of Montross, Va., is charged with eight felony counts of involuntary manslaughter and eight misdemeanor counts of death by vehicle resulting from the Aug. 23, 1996, wreck involving his tractor-trailer, a state-owned van and two other vehicles.

Highway Patrol Sgt. Larry Davis said Dixon was going too fast in his tractor-trailer as he approached a construction zone near the Glenn School Road exit.

Dixon, who was hauling a load of beer, struck two vehicles before plowing into a van carrying nine patients and four employees from John Umstead Hospital, a state psychiatric hospital in Butner.

Seven of the eight who died were patients inside the hospital van, which was returning from a field trip to the North Carolina zoo in Asheboro. The eighth was the driver of one of the other vehicles.

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