Author: Andy Rowell

As many of you have no doubt heard, there has been a misidentification in the accident that occurred on April 26th. Laura VanRyn’s family had been at the bedside of a woman they believed to be Laura since the accident. On May 31st, they announced that the woman was Whitney Cerak.

Of course, I am not a journalist but I just thought I would try to distill the story for my friends.

After I wrote my summary below, I found a more detailed summary on the Detroit Free Press website in the article Crash chaos led to tragic ID mistake. It is excellent.

From what I understand from the newspapers, this is what happened.

A semi-truck crossed over the large grassy median on interstate 69 about 10 miles from the Taylor campus at about 8 pm on April 26. The semi hit a Taylor van carrying four Taylor employees and five students. It is believed that the driver had fallen asleep because there was no evidence of braking according to the police report. Also another truck driver reported that he had seen the semi-truck drifting earlier and he had tried to alert the driver on the CB.

At the scene, five people were killed. Whitney Cerak was in critical condition. She and one of the other employees were taken in a helicopter to Fort Wayne’s hospital. Unfortunately, one of the earliest arriving rescue workers mistakenly pinned the ID cards of Laura VanRyn to Whitney’s chest. From this point forward, Whitney was thought to be Laura.

After arriving there, Laura’s parents have stayed by the side of Whitney for five weeks. They have blogged daily about her progress at a blog here. (Update June 13: the VanRyn family has removed the lauravanryn@blogspot.com blog). They did not recognize that this was not their daughter. She had a neck brace and a lot of bruising initially. Laura’s boyfriend and other friends also visited Whitney who they thought to be Laura.

Meanwhile, the five deceased victims were taken to Marion Hospital. Three Taylor administrators went there to attend to the many concerned Taylor students who had gathered there. While they were there they were asked to identify the victims. They were given the names of Brad Larson, Monica Felver, Betsy Smith, Laurel Erb, and Whitney Cerak. They matched the victims to these people. They were not given the name Laura VanRyn. Since then, there have been memorial services for those five people including Whitney. Whitney’s family decided not to view the body – choosing instead to remember Whitney "the way they remembered her." It is hard to say if they would have realized in looking at the body that it was not Whitney but rather Laura. The funeral service for Whitney had a closed casket.

On May 18, one of Laura’s roommates who had been visiting the woman thought to be Laura in the hospital expressed her concern to Taylor officials that there may have been a misidentification. Taylor University then began a quiet investigation to solicit reports on how the identification of the victims had taken place. Taylor reports that the roommate’s parents have expressed their satisfaction that their daughter’s concerns were taken seriously by Taylor officials. They had not made further progress in the investigation when the misidentification was publicly announced by the coroner on May 31st.

On the days leading up to May 31st, Whitney began to become more alert. When she was addressed as "Laura" by Laura’s family, she would respond "No, Whitney." When she was asked to write her name, she wrote "Whitney Cerak." At that point, the family compared Whitney’s teeth with Laura’s past dental records. It became clear that this woman they had cared for was not their daughter. At that point, the Cerak’s were contacted and were reunited with their daughter.

Since then, Whitney has been meeting with friends and family. We are hopeful that she will make a complete recovery. Today was Laura’s memorial service.

This has made the news all over the world. I am in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada and it has been in all the newspapers here.

All of my information has been gleaned from reports in the Marion Chronicle and the Indy Star online. You can search for Cerak or VanRyn there. Also, Taylor University’s website has a lot of information.

I posted about the original accident earlier in the month here.

Here are some places for photos:
– Photo of Laura VanRyn and Whitney Cerak side by side at Taylor website.
– Chronicle Tribune Photos of the accident site.

Thank you for your prayers for the VanRyn family and everyone else involved.

Additional note: You can find updates on Whitney Cerak at the Cerak Family Blog. You can also access the Cerak blog from the Taylor In Memory Page.