{"id":307801,"date":"2026-06-15T11:43:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-15T11:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/307801\/"},"modified":"2026-06-15T11:43:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-15T11:43:09","slug":"man-accused-in-deadly-i-75-wrong-way-crash-faces-court-in-charlotte-county-charlotte-county","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/307801\/","title":{"rendered":"Man accused in deadly I-75 wrong-way crash faces court in Charlotte County | Charlotte County"},"content":{"rendered":"

CHARLOTTE COUNTY, Fla. (WINK) \u2014 The man accused of causing\u00a0a\u00a0deadly<\/a>\u00a0wrong-way crash<\/a>\u00a0in May on I-75 in Charlotte County is set to appear in court on Monday.<\/p>\n

Dennis Olson is scheduled to be arraigned, at which point he will formally hear the charges against him and enter a plea. He’s been in custody without bond since a deadly crash that killed 21-year-old Lauren Akey,<\/p>\n

The crash happened just after 1 a.m. on May 17. Florida Highway Patrol said video shows Olson driving north on I-75 just after making an illegal U-turn through the median and driving the wrong way.<\/p>\n

Moments later, a head-on crash killed Akey. The impact also involved another vehicle driven by Jaqueline Flores, who, along with her two sons, was seriously injured.<\/p>\n

“I remember just seeing his headlights, but it was too little, too late,” Flores said. “I somehow reacted in time and swerved to the right to avoid a complete head-on collision with us, but he still hit us.”<\/p>\n

Akey was on her way home from a wedding and had texted her parents she was almost home just minutes before the crash. Her family says she was just starting her life.<\/p>\n

“She would’ve done amazing things,” a family member said. “Her life was just getting started with her boyfriend. She was going to graduate next year. I just want everyone to see her and feel that.”<\/p>\n

Troopers said Olson’s blood alcohol level was nearly three times the legal limit after the crash. Olson is charged with DUI manslaughter and vehicular homicide.<\/p>\n

The arraignment is set for 9:30 a.m. at the Charlotte County Courthouse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHARLOTTE COUNTY, Fla. (WINK) \u2014 The man accused of causing\u00a0a\u00a0deadly\u00a0wrong-way crash\u00a0in May on I-75 in Charlotte County is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307802,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[209,211,210,4250,20685,115],"class_list":["post-307801","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news","tag-charlotte","tag-desoto","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307801","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307801"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307801\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307801"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}