Woman charged in Friday Bladen fatality.
Two people died in unrelated crashes within 24 hours in Columbus, and a Clarkton man died in a Bladen crash Friday afternoon.
Charges have been filed in the Bladen fatality, and charges are pending in Thursday’s crash near Union Valley.
The Columbus wrecks were the 12th and 13th fatalities here this year, and the seventh and eighth in less than two weeks.
“It’s been a tough time,” said First Sgt. Andrew Pait of the Highway Patrol.
Thursday’s crash involved two SUVs on U.S. 74 near Union Valley, just before 3 p.m.
Cindy Harrelson of Cerro Gordo was traveling west when Juana Hernandez rearended Harrelson’s GMC, Pait said. Harrelson, 56, went off the left shoulder and overturned. Hernandez, 34, crashed in the median.
A passenger in Harrelson’s car, Fannie Blackwell, 81, died in the crash. Charges are pending against Hernandez, who is from Nakina.
The second crash occurred 2.7 miles north of Cerro Gordo on N.C. 242 on Friday morning.
Pait said Jason Smith of Chadbourn was heading south when his 2006 Ford drifted across the center line and collided head-on with a 2022 Chevrolet Tahoe driven by Chassie Strickland of Clarendon. Both vehicles came to rest in the roadway. Smith was airlifted but later pronounced dead at New Hanover Regional.
A Winston-Salem woman is facing charges after crashing into a Clarkton man waiting in a driveway.
Pait said Morgan Scott, 27, was heading west on N.C. 211 East when her Honda went off the road at a high rate of speed and struck a 2000 GMC driven by Richard Howell of Clarkton. Howell was waiting to pull into the roadway, Pait said.
Howell, 87, was pronounced dead at the scene, and Scott was treated at the scene for minor injuries. She has been charged with possession of marijuana and paraphernalia, driving while impaired, and felony death by vehicle. She is being held in the Bladen County Detention Center under $50,000 secured bond.
March was an especially deadly month on Columbus County roadways.
Two men were killed in a head-on collision near Bolton on March 17, then a man and woman died from their injuries in a single-vehicle crash March 20. A Lumberton truck driver was ejected and killed on U.S. 74-76 March 25.
