Driver says car hit bus before fatal crash

HARTFORD -- A school bus driver says a car struck the side of his bus and forced it off a highway in Hartford in a crash that killed a teenager.

Paul Burns told WFSB-TV yesterday that he had just merged onto Interstate 84 on the way to a robotics competition Saturday morning when the car hit the left side of the bus, which crashed through a guardrail and dropped down a 20-foot embankment.

Burns also says he wasn't aware the bus he was driving was above the weight limit for his bus license.

Sixteen-year-old Vikas Parikh of Rocky Hill died in the crash.

State Police are investigating and no charges have been filed.

A lawyer for the car's driver, 16-year-old Christopher Toppi of Glastonbury, told the Hartford Courant that he doesn't believe his client did anything wrong.