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A Brooklyn Park man convicted of killing five young women in a 2023 high-speed crash faces sentencing Thursday morning.
In June, a Hennepin County jury found Derrick Thompson guilty on all charges, including five counts of third degree murder and 10 counts of criminal vehicular homicide.
Thompson, the 29-year-old son of former DFL State Rep. John Thompson, had rented a Cadillac Escalade SUV at MSP Airport on June 16, 2023 and was driving it at more than 100 miles per hour when he exited Interstate 35W and crashed into a sedan on Lake Street.
Driver Sahra Gesaade, 20, was killed instantly along with Salma Abdikadir, 20, Sagal Hersi, 19, Siham Odhowa, 19 and Sabiriin Ali, 17. The five Somali-American women had been running errands and getting henna tattoos in preparation for a friend’s wedding.
Sgt. Kristofer Geiger, a Minnesota State Patrol crash reconstruction expert, told jurors that Thompson made little effort to slow down, and the SUV went airborne seconds before the crash. Geiger testified that the vehicle’s data recorder showed that the accelerator was “almost to the floor” 3.5 seconds before the crash, and that Thompson pressed the brake pedal only one second before impact.
The defense tried to argue that his brother Damarco was driving. But in a surprise move, prosecutors compelled Damarco to testify, and he told the jury that he was not in the vehicle at the time of the crash.
Derrick Thompson is also awaiting sentencing in a related federal case for the pistol and 2,000 fentanyl pills police found in the wrecked SUV.
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