Piedmont Woman Calling For Stricter Drunk Driving Laws

A GoFundMe page has been established for the family of a Yukon woman who was killed in a repeat drunk driver accident on the Kilpatrick Turnpike on New Year’s Eve. 

Troopers say 36-year-old Craig Maker was drunk when he plowed into the back of an SUV 37-year-old Mandy Starkey-Carson was driving on the Kilpatrick Turnpike near the Wilshire Exit Saturday night. 

Starkey-Carson was killed. Her 9-year-old daughter and an 18-year-old foreign exchange student, who’s also a family friend, we’re critically injured in the accident. Starkey-Carson’s 4-year-old daughter escaped the accident without serious injuries.  

Court records show Maker has four previous DUI convictions. He is being held in the Canadian County Jail without bail. 

Melanie Berry’s mother, Debra Reed, was also killed by a repeat drunk driver Labor Day weekend 2013. She says Oklahoma’s repeat DUI offender laws should be strengthened.

“You know, I know life is not fair. But what I need, and what as a public has got to start doing, is people have to stand up and they have to stop someone,” she said. “It’s not being nosy, it’s not somebody else’s business, it could be your family down the road that gets hit.”