Man, woman die in first two road deaths of 2010

By Nancy Flake 
Two people died in separate accidents Monday in the first Montgomery County highway deaths of 2010.

Around 8 p.m. Monday, a 33-year-old woman attempting to cross the southbound main lanes in the 700 block of Interstate 45 was struck by at least one vehicle and killed, Precinct 2 Justice of the Peace Trey Spikes said.

“One eyewitness said she was dancing in the lanes,” said Spikes, who pronounced the woman dead. “She was initially struck by at least one vehicle and then hit by a couple more vehicles.”

The woman was dressed in dark clothing, Spikes said. Her name could not be released because next of kin had not yet been notified.

Traffic was blocked on the main southbound lanes from Texas 105 to South Loop 336 as Conroe Police worked to clear the scene. Traffic was diverted onto the southbound feeder for at least two hours.

In East Montgomery County, a single-vehicle accident took the life of a Houston man early Monday.

Lesley McDuffie, 43, was killed around 1:30 a.m. Monday while driving a 2001 Dodge pick-up. He was southbound on U.S. 59 near West Wallis, located south of FM 1314, when he left the roadway and entered the roadway between U.S. 59 and the west feeder, a Texas Department of Public Safety official in Conroe said. The accident occurred half a mile north of Houston.

“The vehicle struck the guard rail and then a concrete pillar,” the DPS official said.

McDuffie was not wearing a seatbelt, the official said. Weather conditions were clear and dry.

DPS Trooper Ryan Clendennen was the investigating officer. Clendennen did not immediately return phone messages seeking additional information.

Precinct 4 Justice of the Peace James Oren Metts pronounced McDuffie dead at the scene of the accident, a DPS official said.

No other details of the crash were available.

McDuffie’s death marks the first vehicle fatality in Montgomery County on 2010.

In 2009, The Courier reported on 66 motor vehicle accidents on Montgomery County roadways. The Texas Department of Transportation did not yet have data compiled on 2009 fatalities by county, but reported 46 fatalities in 2008, according to www.txdot.gov.