Athens-Clark County Police are investigating a single-vehicle crash that claimed the life of a 20-year-old Commerce man. The deceased driver is identified as Austin Marjuan Tarpkins.
Police say Tarpkins was driving a 2002 Ford Escape north on South Lumpkin Street when he ran off the road while negotiating a sharp curve between Gran Ellen Drive and Old Princeton Road. An eyewitness told officers he saw the vehicle enter the curve “at a high rate of speed, leave the road, and flip.” The Ford Escape slid down an embankment and struck a tree on the driver’s side.
Tarpkins was pronounced dead at the scene. The front-seat passenger, 19-year-old Macie Chastain of Box Springs, GA, sustained minor, non-life-threatening injuries, police say. EMS transported her to Piedmont Athens Regional Medical Center for treatment.
The fatal crash happened around noon Thursday, January 20. The investigation is ongoing. Athens-Clarke police are asking anyone else who may have witnessed the crash to contact them.
This is the first fatal motor vehicle crash of 2022 in Athens-Clarke County.
