May 20, 2019
By: Dwayne Page
A reckless driver involved in a crash last Tuesday while trying to evade arrest is now facing several charges.
31 year old Christopher Clinton Ogletree of Earl Avenue, Smithville will make a court appearance on May 23 for evading arrest and reckless endangerment by the sheriff’s department. His bond totals $15,000. The Tennessee Highway Patrol also has charges against him.
Sheriff Patrick Ray said that on Tuesday May 14 Central Dispatch received a call of a reckless driver operating a gold Chevy S-10 pickup truck on Cookeville Highway. A deputy spotted the truck traveling erratically and at a high rate of speed. As the deputy was turning around to initiate a traffic stop, he lost sight of the truck as it sped away. Moments later the truck was involved in a personal injury crash with another automobile on North Congress Boulevard in Smithville. Ogletree admitted to officers at the scene that he spotted the deputy turning around to come after him and he picked up speed trying to get away.
Sheriff Ray said for several days after the crash reports came in from motorists complaining that this same truck had passed them on Cookeville Highway in various places from Silver Point to Smithville prior to the wreck.
Trooper C.J. Withers of the Tennessee Highway Patrol, who conducted the crash investigation, said that Ogletree, traveling south in a 2003 Chevy S-10, crossed into an oncoming lane to pass other vehicles in front of him when he lost control and ran off the left side of the highway into the grass. The truck then came back across the highway and struck a southbound Hyundai Elantra, driven by 55 year old Alena Meraz of Tulsa, Oklahoma. Her husband Francisco was a passenger. Upon impact both vehicles went off the right side of the highway. The Hyundai came to a stop in a corn field.
According to Trooper Withers, Ogletree faces DUI and other charges by the THP.