Copyright M Live Michigan
A dead horse lay in the snowy field still attached to its mangled buggy. Henry Troyer, the 27-year-old Amish driver, lay nearby barely clinging to life as the sun rose in the east. A black lantern box bearing his name was ripped from the carriage. It was a cold Monday morning in March, about 6:30 a.m., near the Amish communities of Gladwin and Clare counties. Moments earlier, an oncoming SUV struck Troyer as it attempted to overtake a school bus, according to police. Despite their efforts, medics airlifted Troyer to a hospital in Ann Arbor where he died 11 days later. The other driver was cleared of any crime. In August, Rudy and Jemima Shetler and their five children were clomping along a Montcalm County road in a buggy when a pickup slammed into them during a misjudged passing attempt. Three days later, they were burying their 4-month-old daughter. Troyer and the Shetler baby were among four members of Michigan’s Amish community to die in buggy crashes this year – and many others have suffered serious or critical injuries. In Delta County, two Amish women were injured after being rear-ended by a pickup in April. One suffered brain damage, and another will likely be paralyzed for life. In Van Buren County, a 10-year-old Amish girl lost both of her legs when her family’s buggy was struck from behind in August. Then in Clare County, a 4-month-old suffered a head injury after being thrown from a buggy on Sept. 3. When horse-drawn wooden carriages going 12 mph meet two-ton steel vehicles going 55 mph, the outcomes can be lopsided and bloody. The fatalities highlight a disturbing trend in Michigan. While there’s no national database that tracks Amish crashes, Michigan State Police data shows the four deaths in 2025 are the most in a single year in the past decade. “I just tend to see a lot more of these accidents showing up reported in Michigan,” said Erik Wesner, who created Amish America, a website and media company focused on the Amish. “In recent times but also going back several years, some of the worst ones I’ve seen come out of Michigan ... I’m just continuously amazed.” It raises the question – what can be done to stop them? CRASHES There are more than 50 Amish settlements in Michigan with a population of 18,445, the sixth largest in the country. North America has about 400,910 Amish. Pennsylvania has the most. The Amish aren’t a single, uniform group. While they share core tenets, each community sets its own rules. One of the most conservative in Michigan are the Swartzentruber Amish, who have a large presence in Gladwin County, where Troyer lived. “There are certain things that the Swartzentruber don’t have that the north Gladwin Amish would have, and there are things that we have that neither of them would have,” said Paul Miller, an Amish bishop in a 1,500-member Clare County community. “Each group decides the practices they want to follow.” One well-known practice is the use of horse-drawn buggies over automobiles. While some Amish communities in Michigan allow buggy drivers to use bright electric lights, others like the conservative Swartzentruber Amish only allow two oil lanterns and a small amount of reflective tape. In Michigan counties with the highest number of Amish buggy crashes -- St. Joseph, Gladwin, Branch and Montcalm are the top four – it’s not uncommon to see buggies being driven along rural highways with 55-mph speed limits. And it’s not always clear how to approach the situation as a driver. Horse and buggies are classified as “slow-moving vehicles” along with farm and construction equipment that travel at speeds under 25 mph. Michigan’s vague and limited laws say drivers may not follow “more closely than is reasonable and prudent” and “shall pass at a safe distance to the left of that vehicle.” That lack of clarity, combined with speed and visibility issues, creates dangerous situations, Clare County Sheriff John Wilson said. “A lot of people don’t understand the distance and speed thing,” he said. “Last year, I was going to a ball game and my wife suddenly said, ‘Look out.’ I thought it was a deer. I swerved and then realized it was an Amish flatbed trailer pulled by a horse — no markings, no reflectors, nothing. “If my wife wouldn’t have said something, I would have hit him.” Situations like this have led to deadly crashes over the years. In August, the phone rang at the home of 27-year-old Nate Byler, an Amish man who lives in Clare County. It was a recording from the community hotline. That’s how information is spread, often recorded by the church bishop. On this day the recorded voice shared news of yet another fatal crash in a neighboring Amish community. A 58-year-old Amish woman died when her buggy was hit from behind by a Jeep Cherokee in Gladwin County. “The lady who was killed, I didn’t know her,” Byler said. “I knew her husband and her boys. I talk to her boys quite a lot.” He attended the wake. The Amish community is so tightknit that there is usually a connection. Byler also knew cousins of Troyer, who died in March. Barbara Stutzman is an Amish woman who also lives in Clare County. Her entire 13-member family travels with a team of horses for hours on 55 mph roads in a large carriage, known as a surrey, to attend church or visit relatives. Nearly 90% of all Amish collisions occur on roads with speed limits above 50 mph, state police data shows. She doesn’t fear riding a buggy but knows the danger – her 31-year-old sister, Sarah Stutzman, and the child she was pregnant with died while riding a buggy after being struck from behind by a work van in December 2015. Three of Sarah Stutzman’s children were also injured but survived. The driver, high on marijuana at the time, was given a 1-year suspended sentence, according to records. Barbara Stutzman grieves her sister but doesn’t judge the man. It was “a cloudy, rainy day and it was difficult to see,” she said. “We just felt it’s God’s plan.” FORGIVENESS Stutzman’s response is typical of the Amish. They accept the tragedies as the “will of God.” They don’t push new laws – in fact, they often fight them -- or harsher penalties. They don’t file personal injury lawsuits and forgive quickly. It’s their culture. “We want to take steps to be safe, but at the same time, if something happens, we believe that God allowed it to happen for a reason,” said Bishop Miller. “And in that, we can rest secure that we’re trusting in His hand to lead us in the way he wants to.” Bishop Miller’s brother-in-law and wife were struck by a vehicle in Isabella County while walking to church on Oct. 16, 2022. The wife died, but Miller said his community didn’t seek judicial vengeance against the woman who drove with a fogged-over windshield. They did the opposite. Miller and others requested a meeting with the county prosecutor. “We just explained that we realize you have a job to do and we’re not trying to hinder that, we just want you to know that we have forgiven her,” Miller said. “And we don’t want them to make the punishment harder because of us.” The woman pleaded guilty to committing a moving violation causing death and received probation, Isabella County court records show. Clare County Sheriff John Wilson remembers a fatal crash in which a distracted motorist struck and killed an Amish person on the side of the road while disciplining his children in the backseat. Amish from the community attended the sentencing and told judge they forgave the man. He received no jail time. “That’s a big part of our culture,” Miller said. LITIGATING LIGHT Reducing the number of crashes involving Michigan’s 20,000-plus Amish residents has proven tricky. Legislative efforts to increase visibility with mandatory reflectors or lights have historically failed. Michigan lawmakers have also attempted to impose safety requirements, most recently in 2019, when then-Sen. Curtis S. Vanderwall, R-Ludington, proposed a law requiring buggies have at least six “lamps or illuminated devices.” The bill stalled but Vanderwall, who is now a state representative, said he still supports mandatory lighting. However, previous court rulings could make that difficult. A 1982 Michigan law requires vehicles that travel below 25 mph attach a “slow-moving vehicle” emblem, commonly reflective orange triangles, to the rear. However, they’re conspicuously absent from many buggies. That’s because the Swartzentruber Amish successfully fought and won a legal challenge in 1988. Eli Troyer, an Amish man who was ticketed in Gladwin County for failing to comply with the law, argued the triangles violated his community’s “humble and plain way of life,” according to the 1988 state Court of Appeals ruling. “The principal thrust of his testimony was that forcing the Amish to display the (slow-moving vehicle) emblem would mean the Amish were trusting in the symbols of man rather than trusting in the protection of God,” the court decision said. The court ruled justification for the law didn’t overcome the Amish community’s First Amendment religious rights. The same logic might be applied to the forced use of lights. LAWSUIT While Amish tend to avoid politics and rarely appear at city council meetings, they will fight when their way of life or customs are challenged. Swartzentruber Amish in Ohio are currently embroiled in a lawsuit fighting a 2022 law that requires Amish to place blinking yellow lights atop their buggies. As a result of the law, hundreds of Amish “received citations, escalating fines and even jail-time for non-compliance,” said attorneys with the Harvard Law School’s Religious Freedom Clinic, who are assisting the Amish in their court challenge. The Swartzentruber Amish “believe the Bible commands that they live humbly ... and avoid worldly and showy behavior,” the lawsuit said. “Swartzentrubers are among the most conservative Amish denominations, and their religious beliefs compel them to reject electric buggy lights and other encroachments of modern society.” The lawsuit is pending; however, an Ohio judge for now barred police from enforcing the law against the plaintiffs and reduced their existing bond amounts to $1. LIGHTS But other Amish communities have been more flexible. Wesner said Amish across the U.S. have shown they’re willing to take safety precautions within the framework of their religion. He gave the example of some communities placing PVC pipe on their buggy wheels, which has an “oscillating, almost like a blinking effect.” A community in Pennsylvania paints their buggies bright yellow, and another in Nebraska uses white. “There are solutions for these groups that would be culturally acceptable to them,” Wesner said. “I think lawmakers need to achieve an understanding of these groups and ... come up with a solution that would be acceptable for them, rather than having nothing. And although Amish are wary of electricity, there are exceptions. The Amish in Clare County, comprised of about a dozen church groups and more than 200 families, have long allowed battery operated lights on their buggies. In the past, they were charged by propane generators, now more frequently by solar. Simon Yoder said some of the Amish youth began adorning their buggies with a gratuitous number of lights. He keeps his own buggy parked and plugged in at the back of his barn on his Clare County farm. On a recent day, he unplugged the buggy and pulled it out by hand, flipped a switch and the lights start blinking. There are headlights, taillights and running lights around the buggy’s perimeter. “We’re really pushing for every buggy to have a strobe light on it,” said Yoder, who was wearing handmade suspenders, pants and a shirt, and black rubber shoes that resemble commercially produced Crocs. His lights have “like 14 different settings.” A battery gauge attached to the velvety teal upholstered roof rail of the buggy reads full. Not far away is a handle for the manual windshield wipers. His horses Maverick and Diamond graze in a nearby coral as garments wag from clotheslines. Maverick is a little slow, so rarely pulls the buggy. Diamond can keep a 10 mph-plus pace. “Some people had like 60 lights,” Yoder said. “We had a lot of buggies with blue lights, green lights, purple lights, and that’s been changed.” Church leaders have since established a maximum of 20 lights per buggy. “Now there’s some that will put a light on, but it’s so dim you can’t even see it,” Clare County Sheriff Wilson said. “But you go to Clare, God, those things seem like freight trains coming at you.” THE REAL PROBLEM – ACCORDING TO THE AMISH While visibility is the primary topic of discussion surrounding Amish crashes, more than 70% of all collisions tracked by state police since 2015 occurred during daylight or limited light periods at dusk and dawn. Wesner and law enforcement who spoke to MLive said a greater concern is often the distracted, reckless and intoxicated drivers who hit them. Ten of 18 fatal crashes since 2015 involved alcohol, drugs or distracted driving, according to state police data. “We’re talking about Amish focusing on their buggy and their lighting, but I don’t think that’s necessarily the main problem here,” Wesner said. “It’s not just the ones without lights that are getting hit. It’s just an easier tact to take, because you can’t change society driving habits as easily as you can make a law about a buggy.” Amish who spoke to MLive said the biggest threats are oncoming vehicles that attempt to pass without adequate clearance or those that approach from the rear at a dangerous pace and getting too close. They wish vehicles would slow down as they approach -- even if they are clear to pass -- leave a sizable gap behind the buggy if they are forced to brake and pull fully to the opposite side of the road when passing. Yoder tries to keep a portion of his buggy on the roadway. “What I’m seeing, by pulling (completely off) they’ll even get closer to you than if you’re on the blacktop,” he said. Despite proven danger, most Amish don’t fear the roadways. “This has been our lifestyle, this is what we’re used to,” Bishop Miller said. “I think faith plays a big role in this.” ‘WATCH FOR BUGGIES’ As long as buggies and vehicles share the same roads, most Amish believe the burden is on non-Amish – whom the Amish refer to as “English” – to head off the next tragedy. Some recommend better signage to make drivers aware when they are in heavily populated Amish areas. But officials continue to look for ways to address the problem. The Branch-Hillsdale-St. Joseph Health Department recently secured a first-of-its-kind $70,000 grant from the Michigan State Police Office of Highway Safety Planning (OHSP) to study Amish crashes. “We had seen several pretty severe accidents in the community, and we had residents who were non-Amish that were very concerned about the number of individuals who are being hit in buggies or while walking on the roads or bicycling, etc.,” said Kris Dewey, a spokesperson for the health department. “And so we started looking into it.” While some blame Amish visibility, most fault inattentive drivers. “We find that fair amount of texting and driving is still going on,” said Gladwin County Sheriff Michael Shea, whose community has the second highest number of Amish crashes. “People are just not paying attention.” Meanwhile, the so-called English regularly attempt to aid the Amish when tragedy strikes, even though the Amish often reject it. In Gladwin County where a 4-month old recently suffered a head injury, neighbors have provided the parents rides to and from Saginaw, where the girl was being treated. The family refused an offer of financial donations. Residents in Van Buren County, however, have collected thousands to support a Bloomingdale Township family of six that was rear-ended by an alleged speeding drunk driver on Aug. 8. Five in the family were seriously injured, including a 10-year old girl who lost a leg in the crash scene and later had the other amputated. She is home now “scooching around” the house, able to use the bathroom and get dressed without assistance, said Kim Kester, a 68-year-old neighbor who is helping collect funds for the family. Kester developed an affinity for the Amish as a child while spending vacations at her grandfather’s farm. “It’s their religion and you have to respect their ways,” she said. “And I do to this day. I’ll go slow around them, I won’t honk, I won’t make loud noises to startle the horses, and I believe everybody should do that.” To increase awareness, Kester sells yard signs reminiscent of the “Look twice, save a life” signs meant to protect motorcyclists. As of mid-September, she had sold 100 in under a month and was preparing to place another order. The message is simple – a yellow and white sign with an image of a black horse and buggy in the center. “Slow down,” it reads. “Watch for buggies.”
