Update: Hear more on this story from Berkeley County Sheriff’s Chief Deputy of Staff Eric Burnett and Office Administrator Brandy Sullivan here.
INWOOD, W.Va. — A crash Friday in Inwood claimed two lives and police have arrested the driver of the vehicle.
Berkeley County Sheriff Rob Blair says Omar Magdiel Arguelle Ortega, 27, of Martinsburg was impaired when he drove a vehicle on I-81 northbound early Friday morning. Near mile marker 6, Ortega lost control of the vehicle and when it went off the roadway into the median on the left side, it rolled multiple times.
Deputies arrived around 3:30 a.m. to find the vehicle on its top. One person had been ejected from the vehicle and another was trapped inside the car. Both of those individuals were pronounced dead at the scene.
Mr. Ortega sustained non life-threatening injuries.
“Mr. Ortega was determined to be impaired while operating the vehicle and was arrested by Deputy Clark for DUI causing death x2,” according to the Sheriff.
The identities of those killed in the accident have not been released as next of kin have yet to be notified. “There were some discrepancies of names of the two victims as both had a US ID and Mexico ID with different names on each. It is believed they may not be legal residents,” according to the press release from the sheriff’s department.
