Fatality Crash Closes I-44

Tuesday, March 13th 2007, 10:21 pm

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ A fatality crash on Interstate 44 in north Oklahoma City forced the Oklahoma Highway Patrol to shut down westbound lanes of the interstate Tuesday afternoon.

OHP trooper Kera Philippi says an eastbound car crossed the median and slammed into a westbound one-ton pickup truck just before 4 o-clock Tuesday afternoon near I-44 and Kelley.

Philippi says 24-year-old James J. Sieber of Midwest City, the driver of the car, died in the crash.

She says the driver of the truck, 53-year-old Thelbert H. Culver of Inola, was treated for back and neck injuries at an Oklahoma City hospital and released.

Westbound traffic was being diverted at Martin Luther King Boulevard, and the eastbound lanes of I-44 were narrowed to one lane.

Both directions of the interstate were reopened just before 6 p.m.