Four Amish men killed after semi slams into “Amish taxi” van head-on
Reports are out of a terrible accident yesterday in Jay County, Indiana. No news reports I’ve seen are actually identifying the victims as Amish – but I’ve been informed by a reliable source that this was in fact an “Amish taxi”.
An Amish taxi would be a vehicle with a non-Amish driver hired to drive Amish people to and from work, the store, and longer-distance journeys.
The four men who have died all have typical Amish names, and range in age from 19 to 50. You can also see a large crowd of Amish people gathered at the scene in the photo below.
In addition to the four fatalities, the driver is currently hospitalized in critical condition. And you can understand that outcome with one look at the van in the photo at top of this post.
But how did this happen? Apparently the driver of a semi, rather than slowing when approaching another slowed-down semi, instead swerved into oncoming traffic (via Commercial Review):
According to a news release from Indiana State Police, 44-year-old Gert Pretorius of Geneva was driving a 2019 International semi east on Indiana 67 about 3:30 p.m. Tuesday when he slowed down for traffic.
Bekzhan Beishekeev, 30, Philadelphia, was driving a 2022 Freightliner semi east behind Pretorius and didn’t stop, instead swerving into the westbound lane.
At the same time, Donald Stipp, 55, Portland, was driving a 2011 Chevrolet van west on the road with Henry Eicher, Menno Eicher, Paul Eicher and Simon Girod as his passengers. The semi Beishekeev was driving struck the van head-on.
More on the victims:
Henry Eicher, 50, Menno Eicher, 25, Paul Eicher, 19, were pronounced dead at the scene of the collision at the intersection of Indiana 67 and county road 550 East. Simon Girod, 23, died later at a hospital.
Jay County Coroner’s Office confirmed Wednesday that all four men who died suffered multiple blunt force trauma injuries.
A fifth passenger in the van apparently survived and is being treated at a local hospital. The driver of the semi, Beishekeev, was unhurt.
Beishekeev has reportedly been arrested, however – but through a “bench warrant”, which would mean an arrest for charges unrelated to the crash.
The report at WANE notes that “A bench warrant is used for individuals who fail to comply with certain court-ordered measures, usually in another county or state.”
The Indiana State Police are currently investigating the incident. The Amish living in Jay County are part of the settlement better known by the name of neighboring Adams County. It is the fifth-largest Amish settlement in the country, with over 11,000 Amish residents.
Another Amish Taxi Wreck
The “Amish taxi” is commonly used in many Amish communities, reflecting the reality that sometimes work takes Amish people further than they can reasonably go by buggy, bicycle or other sanctioned form of transport.
But sometimes they are involved in bad accidents. Last summer, five Amish in a passenger van were killed in Michigan after a truck ran a stop sign. And in 2024, nine people lost their lives in a catastrophic wreck in Wisconsin, with only a two-year-old Amish boy surviving.
There is a GoFundMe now active for the driver of the Amish taxi van, Donald Stipp. If you would like, you can contribute to that here or below. Prayers for him and his family that he makes a full recovery.
Update: Photo of Arrested Semi Driver Released; Reporter: “Being Held On An ICE Detainer”
A photo has been made available of the semi truck driver, Bekzhan Beishekeev, 30, via the Jay County Sheriff’s Department.
As noted above, it’s been reported that Beishekeev was not arrested related to the crash (at least not at this time), but for a bench warrant, indicating an unrelated matter.
Angela Ganote, a morning anchor at Indianapolis-based FOX 59 station, shared the following on her Facebook page: “I talked to one of the jail officers who said Bekzhan Beishekeev is being held on an ICE detainer.”
According to another report by shipping industry publication Freight Waves, it’s suggested that Beishekeev is a national of Kyrgyzstan, in an article drawing attention to the suspect practices of a Kyrgyzstani transport company operating in the US.
I can also say that there is a Facebook page of a man by the name of Bekzhan Beishekeev (Бекжан Бейшекеев in Cyrillic) who bears a very close resemblance to this man, and who is wearing military uniform which appears very similar if not the same as uniforms worn in the Kyrgyzstani military.
How many total passengers were in the van?
About Donald Stipp, Angela Ganote adds: “He was hired to take the Amish work crew to their job and back. His family tells me others were injured in the crash.”
It has already been made known that there was a fifth passenger in the van that had survived. This comment by Ganote – “others” – suggests there may have been more. If this was a typical passenger van, Stipp may have had 10 or more passengers on board.
It’s been reported that Indiana State Police were called to the accident scene by Jay County Sheriff’s Department at around 4 pm, suggesting they would have been on their way home after a day’s work when this happened.
Depending on what stage of the journey they were on, some may have been dropped off at home already, as typically these vans are making multiple stops within the community.
Ganote also reports that van driver Donald Stipp has undergone surgery. On the GoFundMe page, Stipp’s daughter-in-law adds an update: “He is out of arterie surgery and he is stable!!” So that is at least one piece of good news out of this tragic situation.
“Oh my stars—my heart aches for everyone involved. As a fellow taxi driver to the Amish, I know firsthand just how demanding and dangerous this calling can be. We’re out there at all hours, often pushing through treacherous conditions on very little sleep, covering more miles in a single stretch than most folks would ever dream of. It honestly feels like a miracle that we don’t see more tragedies like this.
I was so relieved to see a fundraiser for the driver, Donald. Most taxi drivers I know are just barely eeking by, and he’s going to need every bit of help for the long road to recovery. I have no doubt our Amish neighbors will be surrounding him and these families with incredible support.
There’s an Amish proverb that says: ‘Live each hour with God and the years will take care of themselves.’ I’m holding onto the faith that He has each of these accident men, and both of those drivers, in His capable hands.
Haley, very glad to see your comment on this. Of course I thought of you as I was first putting this together, and your comments in your posts on this site about various unsafe situations that would arise in your time driving the Amish.
One thing I’ve gathered from your writings is that you have always been very conscious of the potential for danger in driving a sizeable group of people long distances (as we’re seeing in your current series, even).
Here it sounds like this driver was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, though hopefully he, at least, is going to make it. I also still would like to know about who else was in the van – was it just one other passenger, or were there more. It sounds like the wreck happened sometime before 4pm.
Reply
So comment on Twitter about it so I came here to find out
How
How do these unqualified foriegn cdl holders get a license in the first place? (Take a wild guess). How many more innocent victims die before we ensure skilled domestic drivers are vetted transport our freight. Complete idiocy.
First thing I thought when I heard of this crash, illegal driver! He obviously wasn’t paying attention, perhaps texting or speeding, but WHO swerves into the oncoming lane ever? He could have put the truck on the OFF side, even if it destroyed the truck. Even the trucking company is foreign owned!!! So it sounds like one family lost three members and my heart bleeds to hear that. IMO, every asset this company owns needs to be confiscated and given to the victims. How does a foreign owned company get the money for a brand new truck? And one doesn’t need to guess what my politics are. America first, America ONLY.
Exactly Martha!
Truck accident
Wonder if we are looking at a driver that got a Ca. CDL. No test require. Just pay and off you go.
Seat belts?
So what do you think, were they buckled up?
buckled up?
Great question – When I drove Amish in my maxi-van, I had it licensed so only the front two passengers legally had to be buckled up. From your comment, I’m guessing you already know that many Amish prefer to go seatbeltless in vans. Either way, it was a tragedy, and we should extend compassion to everyone involved.
Seat belts
Seat belts won’t help a head on collision with 80,000 pounds moving at speed with a van going the speed limit. Dropping the hammer on companies that knowingly hire and enable unqualified people to drive semis, with fraudulant CDL A licenses, might help.
The real culprits!
Actually it’s the people running the trucking company that deserve to be punished criminally for both hiring him and running an unlawful operation.
I worked for a shady trucking company like that in Springfield Missouri back in the 1980s where they told me to run day and night and falsify my logbook so I turned them in to DOT and they got caught and fined when I turned in the accurate but illegal daily logs, showing that I ran too many hours a day.
So of course they fired me and refused to pay my last few weeks of wages so I sued them in local small claims court and won my pay plus court costs. The company then appealed to the circuit Court and I won again. So I was ready to have the sheriff execute judgment on their buildings and trucks for my back pay and costs and the next day they went out of business and started up under a new name in the exact same buildings using the exact same trucks that had a lien on them and a mortgage on the building so the sheriff told me I would have to put up money so if he repossessed their property and held a sheriff’s sale he didn’t want to lose money, because he didn’t think I’d ever get enough money back to even pay his cost for executing judgment on them. So I never did get my money from that company and I believe this is probably what these companies are doing today because trucking is a big rip off industry. They want their drivers to drive crazy like this fellow did maybe he was out of hours and sleepy or running on pills to keep awake. The problem is the government doesn’t shut these trucking companies down and throw the owners in jail and even if they do I know National Oil and Supply company out of Springfield Missouri who I worked for as an owner operator for a while pulling one of their tankers, is a tanker company that was falsifying the weights of the oil their company drivers hauled to Fort Leonard Wood and they got caught and the owner of national oil and supply company went to federal prison for a couple years but his daughter or somebody kept on running the company I believe and it kept on running after he was released from prison yet. Just lots of corruption and theft and lying and the trucking industry has too many of these shady operations.