Joelle Powell Killed, Jacquell Powell Injured in Alleged Intoxicated Driver Accident in Harris County, TX
Harris County, TX — November 17, 2023, Joelle Powell was killed and Jacquell Powell was injured in an alleged intoxicated driver accident at 11:47 p.m. on F.M. 1942.
Information released by Harris County officials says that the accident took place in the 1600 block of F.M. 1942 Road (Crosby Cedar-Bayou Road), which appears to be just east of Barrett.
According to authorities, Joelle Elisha Powell and Jacquell Powell were in a Honda Accord going westbound along the roadway. While doing so, an eastbound Nissan Maxima apparently crossed into oncoming lanes where it crashed head-on into the Accord.
As a result of this collision, Joelle Powell sustained fatal injuries. Jacquell Powell was taken to a hospital with unspecified injuries. According to officials, the Nissan driver was intoxicated at the time of the accident, and there appears to be a pending charge for intoxication manslaughter.
With the apparent pending intoxication manslaughter charge, it appears authorities are already taking steps to ensure there are appropriate consequences for the allegedly intoxicated driver. It's unclear, though, if anyone else is going to face similar consequences. That will likely depend on if the intoxicant involved here was alcohol and if authorities look into where that alcohol came from.
I've handled wrongful death cases against alcohol providers all over the state. In some places, I find that authorities are already looking into the establishment my team and I are working to investigate, and sometimes they've even already filed charges against a bartender or a store clerk for illegally over-serving a drunk driver. Other times, however, we'll find authorities simply charged the driver and moved on, allowing a negligent alcohol provider to slip through the cracks unless we put them on the authorities' radar.
Harris County, generally speaking, tends to fall in the former group of law enforcement who are more thorough after an intoxicated driving accident, so hopefully their work continues behind the scenes if nothing else. Otherwise, it'd be unfortunate to hear there were multiple parties responsible for someone's death, but only one ever had to answer for their actions in front of a judge.
