With the possibility of criminal charges still looming, Loleini Tonga tells ESPN’s John Barr that deceased Bengals receiver Chris Henry jumped out of the back of the truck she was driving on December 16.
“I think he thought maybe he was going to land. He was going to land right,” she said in an interview that will be aired in its entirety on Sunday at 9:00 a.m. ET.
“I wasn’t going fast,” she added. “Maybe he was scared because he saw someone calling the police.”
She didn’t specify the speed of the vehicle, but she insists she was trying to be careful.
“I know I wasn’t going fast at all because I was trying to drive slow because I knew he was in the back standing up,” she said.
She also says there was no suitable place on the road for stopping.
We understand that she has been through an extremely traumatic event, but we also realize that she is concerned that criminal charges could arise from allegations that she failed to stop the truck or that she was driving it too fast or that she intentionally tried to eject Henry. And her explanation needs to be considered in light of her obvious desire to avoid compounding a bad situation by going to jail for what she genuinely believes was a horrible accident.
Still, the explanation doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Why would he calmly and deliberately choose to jump out of the truck at a time when he was reportedly beating on the back window? And why wouldn’t he simply sit down in the bed of the truck if she was driving slowly and everything was fine and she simply didn’t have a spot where she could pull over so he could get out?
Based on the objective evidence, it’s reasonable to infer either that he fell because of the speed or movement of the vehicle -- or that she tried to knock him out assuming that he would not suffer serious (or fatal) injuries. Under either scenario, she could face criminal charges for causing or contributing to Henry’s death, if it can be proven that her version of the events doesn’t mesh with the available facts, or with common sense.
