Search fatalities

Sierra J. Stricker

Age : 24

Gender : Female

Race : Native American

Date : 10/21/2021

Location : U.S. Highway 77, approximately 1 mile north of Walthill

City : Walthill

County : Thurston

State : Nebraska

Agency : Thurston County Sheriff’s Office

Officer(s) :Not Disclosed

Cause of Death : Vehicle

Event : Bystander killed by police vehicle crash

OPEN RECORDS SUMMARY :

On 10/21/2021, at approximately 5:00 a.m., 25-year-old Sierra J. Stricker of Walthill was struck and killed by an unmarked Nebraska State Patrol vehicle on U.S. Highway 77 approximately one mile north of Walthill. The vehicle was being driven southbound by a Nebraska State Patrol investigator.
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Investigators determined that shortly before she was struck, Sierra had left a residence on the east side of Highway 77. She crossed the northbound lane and entered the southbound lane, where the State Patrol investigator's vehicle struck her. The investigator called for emergency assistance, and Macy Rescue responded, but Sierra was pronounced dead at the scene.
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The available public record does not disclose the investigator's speed before impact, whether the investigator was traveling on official business, where the investigator was going, or why an unmarked State Patrol vehicle was traveling through the area at approximately 5:00 a.m. The State Patrol also did not publicly identify the investigator. Those omissions remained even after the death was presented to a grand jury.
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The later grand-jury reporting is particularly significant because the jury issued five recommendations concerning how Nebraska should investigate crashes involving law-enforcement officers. Among them, jurors recommended that an outside agency establish jurisdiction when an officer is involved in a motor-vehicle crash; that an incident commander from another agency be present; that evidence be logged before removal; that witnesses and involved persons not leave the scene except for medical treatment; that blood draws and drug toxicology testing be conducted as soon as possible; and that the Nebraska State Patrol follow its own policies and procedures in the interest of transparency and maintaining public trust.
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Sierra was a 25-year-old Walthill resident whose life has remained almost entirely absent from the public reporting surrounding her death. Despite extensive searches beyond the original news coverage, publicly indexed obituary, memorial and family coverage sufficient to reliably describe her occupation, children, family relationships or what she was doing at the residence that morning could not be established. The available reporting identifies only that she had just left a home on the east side of Highway 77 before crossing the highway.
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DISPOSITION:
Because Sierra's death involved a law-enforcement officer, the case was ultimately presented to a grand jury. Dakota County District Court Judge Bryan C. Meismer convened the grand jury in September 2022, with Washington County Attorney Scott Vander Schaaf and Chief Deputy Attorney Erik Petersen appointed as special prosecutors. The grand jury returned a No True Bill, finding no criminal conduct in Sierra's death, and the Nebraska State Patrol investigator was not criminally charged.
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The grand jury nevertheless accompanied its decision with five recommendations directed at the handling of law-enforcement vehicle crashes, including independent scene control, evidence preservation, restrictions on involved persons leaving the scene, prompt toxicology testing and greater adherence by State Patrol to its own procedures in the interest of transparency and public trust.
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OFFICER BACKGROUND:
The Nebraska State Patrol specifically did not publicly identify the investigator who was driving the unmarked State Patrol vehicle that struck and killed Sierra Stricker, preventing examination of that investigator's prior crashes, disciplinary history, complaints or other misconduct.
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LITIGATION:
No civil lawsuit arising from Sierra Stricker's death was located in the publicly indexed court and news records searched.

SOURCE LINKS :

https://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/nebraska/article_2d227d79-4f02-5522-900b-029dd022b5d6.html
https://omaha.com/news/state-regional/crime-courts/article_df9a085c-32b0-11ec-a4d5-bb02d3195a67.html
https://delta.creativecirclecdn.com/enterprise/files/20220929-165329-Enterprise%209%3A30.pdf