Wreck Monday claims life of 31-year-old Olney man

A driver trying to avoid hitting a deer in the road before dawn Monday started a chain of events leading to a crash that took the life of an Olney man. According to the Texas Department of Public Safety, Jose Flores, 33, of Carrollton, was driving westbound on Hwy. 114, just past Jean when the wreck occurred. He was driving a Ford F-250 pickup truck with three passengers. At about 5:40 a.m., Flores swerved when he saw a deer in the road, and lost control of his truck, which entered the eastbound lane. William Stephens, 31, of Olney, was eastbound behind the wheel of a Kia passenger vehicle, carrying no passengers. The truck and Kia hit head-on near the Scobee Road intersection with Hwy. 114. Stephens was pronounced dead on scene. Flores and one of his passengers were taken to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The other two passengers in the pickup were not injured. The DPS said Stephens was not wearing a seat belt and there were no other passengers in his vehicle. Flores and the front seat passenger were wearing seat belts. The two passengers in the back seat of the truck were not wearing seat belts. The weather conditions were foggy and misty. There were no other vehicles involved. Stephens is the second person killed on Young County roadways in 2016. On Sept. 4, Edmond Dalton II of Graham was killed in a wreck on Hwy. 251 when the vehicle he was riding in rolled over after the driver overcorrected when trying to avoid another vehicle and lost control of her car. Last year, two people died on Young County roads in two separate accidents, according to the state transportation department’s statistics.