(Stillwater, Okla.) — A Cushing man who is on probation for leaving the scene of an accident on Highway 18, north of Cushing, that killed a pedestrian three years ago has been charged with drunk driving and drug possession in Lincoln County.
Bryan Ray Odle, 27, pleaded guilty last year in Payne County to failure to stop in a fatal accident and negligent homicide in the traffic death of Robert Jason Burt, 33, of Cushing, in 2007.
As part of a plea bargain last year, Odle was given a five-year deferred sentence, six months in the Payne County Jail and fines, along with an order to perform 50 hours of community service.
Last month, Odle was charged in Lincoln County with drug possession and drunk driving in Meeker on Oct. 22. He was freed on $7,500 bail with an order to return to court on Jan. 4, 2011.
Due to Odle’s arrest in Lincoln County, the Payne County District Attorney’s Office maintains that he has violated the terms of probation he was given in the fatal traffic accident north of Cushing that occurred in 2007.
Odle appeared in court last week before Payne County Associate District Judge Stephen Kistler, who reset his case to Dec. 10, a court spokesman told KUSH Tuesday. He remains free on $3,000 bail on his Payne County case.
The Cushing pedestrian’s body was found the morning after the May 18, 2007, accident in a ditch on Highway 18, three-tenth’s of a mile north of 44th Street, according to Oklahoma Highway Patrol Trooper Mark Trunk.
Burt had received a severe injury to his head area, Trunk testified in a preliminary hearing.
The trooper testified that Odle’s black Ford Ranger pickup, which was found about one-quarter of a mile from the scene near 44th Street, “had damage consistent with this type of collision.”
When Odle was interviewed about noon on May 19, 2007, “He did admit he was the owner of the vehicle,” Trunk testified.
“He believed he had struck a roadway sign, just before midnight, May 18, 2007,” Trunk testified.
Odle said, “He continued on down the road south, that the vehicle began running rough and he pulled over.
“He indicated that the vehicle did pull to the right, that he had a continuing problem with that.
“He said it was possible that he left the road, that his vehicle pulled to the right,” Trunk testified.
Prosecutor Tom Lee pointed out that there was a 12-hour gap between the accident and Odle’s coming to the scene of the fatal collision.
OHP Trooper Johnny Fairres said he interviewed Odle at the Cushing police station in the early afternoon the day that Burt’s body was found.
“Mr. Odle told me he heard a body was found at that location — he said he felt bad that he might have hit someone,” Fairres testified.
The pedestrian died from multiple injuries, according to a medical examiner’s report offered into evidence at the preliminary hearing by the prosecutor.
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